


Steal Away Home

by shadoedseptmbr



Category: Dragon Age
Genre: Adventure, Angst, Drama, F/M, Multi, Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-09-03
Updated: 2014-11-02
Packaged: 2017-11-13 11:37:33
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 36
Words: 262,809
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/503120
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadoedseptmbr/pseuds/shadoedseptmbr
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post-game adventure including the reclaiming of Starkhaven.  Sequel to Shelter.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> _Author's Note: Howdy! Well, it took a bit longer than I meant to get started, but here we go. This is the tale of what happens to Aeryn Hawke and Sebastian Vael, post game, post Shelter, in their attempt to restore Sebastian to the throne of Starkhaven. You do not have to have read Shelter, but I have to imagine it would help as I will be building on the base I started there._  
>  F!Hawke/Sebastian Vael, Fenris/Isabela  
> Warnings will be posted as needed with each chapter, but for general purposes, I usually keep the level of violence and language about that of the game. If you play the game or read the previous story, then there's your guide.   
> Thanks go to the lovely and talented **mille libri** , for her beta skills, but of course any errors are mine.  
> Bioware owns all, I'm just happy to play in the sandbox. 
> 
> _Chapter 1 of Steal Away Home, being the sequel of Shelter. We join our story a couple of weeks after we left them._

_Somewhere on the wide Waking Sea, two lovers are wandering the Fade in dreaming._

_One is dreaming a dream that's become familiar over the last few years, though he is buoyed by the hope that it isn't merely a dream anymore. There is a green hill, rising gently before the mountains and a smell in the air like baking bread as the winter wheat ripens in waving sheets of gold. And he stands on the lea of that hill watching a tumble of children with curling dark red hair and bright eyes, playing some sort of scuffling ball game. And just below them, watching them with wry amusement as she comes up is his love and she looks up to see him and the joy in her smile and the dimple in her cheek fill his heart to bursting and it's not hard to fall to his knees in thankful prayer before reaching for her to bearhug her into the grass with the children._

_And one is dreaming of blood and fire and sharp simple things because that is what she almost always dreams, so familiar that she has forgotten it's a nightmare. But recently, those dreams are different and beyond the smoke there is something blazing and blue and maybe it's a lake of cool water or a Harvestmere sky but if she can just struggle on through the mire a bit farther, she'll see what it is. She hasn't made it yet. She almost always wakes up before she even gets close. But it's fine, because she will be twenty nine years old on her next nameday and she can't remember any dream better than waking up next to him, sprawled and snoring softly._

\---000---

Sebastian woke with a start. He'd reached for Aeryn in his dream only to encounter cool blankets. The _Siren's Call II_ drifted on the dark Waking Sea under the moonlight, about a day's sail out of Amaranthine. Pale light spilled in through the porthole, the water lapping against the hull but there was no sign of his love in the small cabin.

They'd been sleeping remarkably well on their voyage. There had been a few nights where she jerked awake, heart racing, but he'd whispered a few low words and then curled himself around her while she relaxed again. Twice he'd come around to find her sitting on the end of the bunk watching him with some soft look on her face and she'd laughed when he told her she was a wee bit spooky. She'd only woken once with night terrors sending her scrambling, the way she'd screamed his name- and pressed her fingers to his pulse on waking- leaving him with no doubt what she'd dreamed that time. Her scream had brought Fenris blazing into the cabin, slamming the door aside. They'd both blushed hard, Aeryn at the fuss she'd caused and Fenris at the unadulterated view of Aeryn's charms before Sebastian had drawn a blanket around her. It had at least answered a question he'd honestly never wanted to ask, Sebastian thought wryly.

She was definitely gone now, though. Sighing, he brushed aside the guilt that dogged him when he didn't wake for her and grabbed the linen trews he kept to hand and tugged his boots on, too. He'd stepped on a stray hook a few days ago. Didn't care to be doing that again. His tunic seemed to be missing.

He stopped in the galley on the off chance, but the tiny kitchen was empty and dark. Climbing the ladder, Sebastian went up to the deck. The night was chilly and damp, but the sky was clear. Millions of stars scattered across the deep sky and he breathed in, holding the icy air in to his lungs. He and Aeryn had sat here a night ago and she'd snugged against him, warm as toast, and he'd never felt the cold while he made up names for the new constellations that she traced out with the tip of her finger. Tonight, there was only Japeth, Isabela's mate, at the wheel and another lad on the rigging. Two more crew were sleeping in the hammocks slung across the stern. "Have you seen Hawke, Japeth?"

The mate shook his dirty blonde braids, earring jangling. "Nah. Not seen her since sunset. She ain't been up the riggings this eve for sure, messere. Hawke's a handy one with the tangles but the Cap'n warned her off the lines at night, before." He adjusted the wheel with a knotted brown hand as Sebastian nodded and scanned the moonlit deck. Aeryn had taken to scaling the ropes for a bit of exercise, staving off cabin fever, but Isabela had some concerns about woodworms and nixed climbing at all, yesterday.

Sebastian was fairly sure the sharp eyed sailor would have spotted Aeryn, unless she was trying to stay hidden. If she was keeping to shadows, no one would see his lass unless they tripped over her. Walking the deck length, just in case, slapping himself to keep the blood flowing to his chilled skin, Sebastian then slid back down the hatch, trying to ignore the knot of worry in his gut. If she'd only been half awake, hunting in a dream...

He shook himself. Don't borrow trouble. She'd probably holed up with Isabela and Varric or Fenris. He glanced down the passageway and stopped short. Fenris.

There wasn't anyone sitting on the stool outside Anders' cabin.

Bethany had taken second watch tonight, he recalled. If Aeryn had sent her to bed, she'd have gone. Light-footed, he stepped farther down the passage and stopped by the door. Oh, yes. Definitely Aeryn's low voice, beyond. He gritted his teeth. It had been _her_ rule that no one be alone with the abomination until they got him to the Grey Wardens at Amaranthine.

Little sneak. Sebastian knew she'd been feeling guilty about her abrupt treatment of the mage after she'd told them all her decision to turn Anders back to his duty. He'd apparently given her too much credit for better sense, though. Sebastian leaned against the door, counting on the creaking ship to cover his noise. Pushing back the anger he felt at having to hunt for her and at her breaking her own rules as well as the creeping cold fear when he hadn't found her, he settled. He'd listen before he burst in.

"… your body count, Hawke?"

Too casually, she answered. "No idea, really. I lost count long before the Deep Roads."

"Think I caught up to you?" She took a breath. It was a bitter question and it had a hard answer, Sebastian knew. He waited for her reply.

"Maybe. Probably not, though." There had been perhaps thirty penitents. A hundred worshippers. A few dozen children. Maybe fifty in the courtyard. She'd done that in her first few years in Kirkwall, even accounting for Varric's penchant for embellishment. Sebastian glanced down, thinking, Oh, Aeryn, none of yours were children or innocents. It's not the same, _mo chride_.

Anders voice was sharp when he asked, "What does your priest think of that?"

None of your business, you _fuathaich_. 

"Just what you believe he thinks, Anders." He could hear the cool reserve in her low voice masking some other emotion and Sebastian just barely restrained himself from entering to reassure her. He was shocked into stillness, though, at Anders' next words.

"Before him...before Vael. If I'd had the courage to do it, before. You'd have helped." Silence. And, oh, he could read a volume in that pause.

That level voice of hers and Sebastian could just see in his mind's eye the even gaze. "You're right. But it has nothing to do with him. If you had come to me in early days...oh, yes Anders. I was angry enough. I was...empty enough. You remember. How glad I was to help you kill Templars for Karl and after? But ...Bethany..."

Anders made an impatient noise, but Aeryn continued, mulishly.

"If Meredith had been sane...Bethany would have been happy in the Circle. I'm not saying it's right for everyone. I'm not saying there doesn't need to be change." She let her pause stretch before she continued. "You know, Sebastian read your manifesto."

The mage sputtered. "He...what? He did?"

"He read it and thought you made some good points. He told me that just the day before...It's not exactly a moot issue for us, Anders. Odds are at least one of our children will be mageblooded."

A nasty laugh preceded his answer. "Prepare to have him rip them from your arms and toss them to his precious..." Sebastian had to lock his knees from going in and smacking the fool across his vicious mouth...but ah, it sounded like Aeryn might do it for him. He heard her pad across the decking, swiftly.

"Shut up. He's promised that he would protect them. That he would...we can keep them safe. It's one of the reasons we're doing the Starkhaven thing."

"And you believe that?"

"Absolutely." And the thrum of certainty in her voice made his heart jerk in his chest and his shoulders square even as it silenced Anders. It was surprisingly difficult to be angry with a woman who spoke of you so.

"And, sodding _Void_ , Anders. Do you realize? You could have come with us. There's no circle in Starkhaven, now. We...we could have tried something new. Something better. And now..."

Hearing the break in her voice, Sebastian decided a united front was needed and he finally pushed open the door to finish Aeryn's sentence. "Now we will do it without you." She was hovering, arms wrapped across her chest, over the seated mage in the small cabin, her form poorly lit by a glowing lantern. He ignored the fact that she was barefoot, wearing his own tunic over the light linen trousers she'd run up to wear in the galley. The too large garment slipped off of one white shoulder, but he did his best not to see it. He was yet upset with her, by the Maker. Truly.

Aeryn's eyes shot to him and widened as her back straightened. Despite walking around like an ill-bred (incredibly delicious, her wicked streak tempted) sailor, bare-chested and tousled from sleep, there was no doubt that Sebastian had arrogant, cool prince stamped on his angular features. Oh, and he was angry. At her, probably. He cocked a precise eyebrow at Anders and held an imperious hand out to her.

She raised her own brow back defiantly and glanced at Anders. "I wouldn't have had us end this way, Anders. I wish we could have done better."

The mage was hunched over his knees on the low slung bunk but he looked up at her with bloodshot hazel eyes. "Yes, well. Me, too, Hawke. For what it's worth, I'm..." He stopped and Aeryn could feel the glower in Sebastian's eyes and the tense frame, but gave Anders some credit for swallowing and continuing. "Sorry it ended that way."

She nodded before slipping past Sebastian and down the dim passage, lit only by one small candle in a hurricane lantern. She rapped on the door of the captain's quarters and in a minute Fenris emerged, strapping the final buckle shut on his gauntlet. He was clearly surprised to have Aeryn at his door, with Sebastian simmering behind her, leaning against the doorframe of their own cabin.

"Hawke?" His voice was still rough from sleep. "I thought..."

"Bethany looked tired. I sent her to bed and took the last bit of her watch." She really hadn't meant to talk to Anders. But, he'd started talking and she didn't want to wake anyone, so...

Fenris looked between them as Sebastian asked, "And I suppose then that your rule about no' being alone with th' mage is still in effect?"

She had the grace to look a bit contrite, then. "Yes. I think it's best." Sebastian snorted and Fenris shook his head as he went to take his post. Sebastian let him pass and then reached behind him and opened the door to their quarters.

Aeryn pursed her lips a second and then stepped into the room with her chin at a taut angle, her eyes flashing. She twitched the tunic back into place on her shoulders, but it slid right off again. Quickly, she unstrapped the sheathed dagger from her arm and twisted to strip another from her thigh while he toed his boots off. Sebastian's hooded gaze never left her shoulders, a present weight as she contemplated just stripping and sliding into the bunk. No, best just face the music.

He heard her sigh before she turned back to him.

"How much did you hear, then?"

"Did you mean it? That you'd have helped him?"

She looked at him through her lashes and for just a hard moment Sebastian thought she might lie to him. But she brought her chin up and only something bleak in her eyes and the slight hunch of her shoulders gave her away. "Yes." She felt small and cold and braced herself, but as often happened these days, the man she loved surprised her with the depths of his heart.

He had to look away for a minute, but he would be honest, too. "And had I known Bethany to be apostate before I came to know you, _leannan_ , I'd have turned her in with no qualm and Merrill, too. We are neither of us the same as we were, Aeryn." Sebastian held his hand out again and this time she took it. He caught it, strong and firm, and pressed it to his heart. "And glad I am of it."

"I wish you had known him a bit, then...well, no I don't. What he's done would..." Her face scrunched up a little as she searched for the words. "Did you know, he and Karl, the one they made Tranquil as a trap? They were lovers. He only came to Kirkwall to save someone he loved, once." Sebastian shook his head. No, he hadn't known.

"Anders had to kill him...Justice woke Karl up for a minute and he begged for death. I offered, but..." She shrugged. "And all I could think of was that if the Chantry got their hands on Bethany, it would be me to do that for her. We were there and if he'd asked me, then? I would have. I would have torn it down myself."

She set her other hand on his chest and curled her nails in, looking up at him. "I'd have done it and cut my heart out and never known it." Her eyes were shadowed in the moonlight, her face as well, but he could hear a shiver in her voice and he ran his fingers into her hair, to stroke that little ridge of bone behind her ear that relaxed her so.

"Is that what you dreamed the other night?" She nodded, her mouth twisted down. "It didn't happen, _a ruin_. The Maker had gentler plans for us." Tugging, he sat her down on the bunk next to him against the wall. She laid her head on his chest, listening to the regular slow thump of his heart as he kept up the steady comforting movement of his fingertips on her skull. "I recall that night. I remember waking up to find the upper hall strewn with corpses. We were appalled that the Templars had clearly used the Chantry for some sort of trap." Burying his nose in her almond scented hair, he asked, "What changed, Aeryn? When did you stop..."

"Being so angry?" 

"Aye."

"Time. Fenris. He was angry enough for the both of us." She gave him a rueful smile and he returned it wanly. "Varric, too. He always knew how to mock me just enough to make me laugh at myself. And I learned to do the same for Fenris. I'd at least had some choice in things, after all." Sebastian swallowed his snort. Yes, all the choice in the world when the father she idolized handed her a pair of daggers and taught her that loving someone meant killing everything in their path.

But- he didn't want to argue about her father in what was left of their night. Instead, he cupped the nape of her neck in his palm and squeezed, letting the little " _unf_ " Aeryn made ripple through him to his groin. Her fingers curled into the crisp hair on his chest and she tugged, earning a grunt from him as well.

Then, she was stretching up to be kissed though she paused at the last minute, teasing. Suddenly starving for a taste of her, he closed the gap hungrily, sucking her lush lower lip in as he drew her to him, hands skating under the loose tunic and up her smooth, strong back. They clung, lips fused for a few long minutes before he broke away to explore. "You've stolen something of mine, _leannan_ ," he whispered as he dropped kisses along her jaw.

"Smelled good. Smelled like you." Aeryn buried her nose in the pulse of his throat and hummed as her fingers traced the lean, ridged muscle of his stomach and up to the broader plains of his chest. Tasting sun on his skin where he'd turned a darker golden tan while pitching in to help above decks.

His fingers nimbly pulled the tie of her loose trousers and skimmed them off the luscious curve of her bare hips. No smalls. Maker, this woman. He pulled her up his body, closer yet, fingers pressing into the firm flesh of her bottom and she shifted against the hardening length against her stomach. "You made me come to hunt for you. In the cold."

"It's true."

"I might have to exact payment."

"Gracious. Poor me. Please, my prince. Spare this repentant penniless maiden." Breathless, she undulated against him and flashed him wide, innocent eyes. The contrast sent a spasm of urgent lust lancing through Sebastian's nerves, but he prolonged the game, bringing up his old arrogance in his voice.

"Penniless, is it?" He curved his hand under her breast, weighing the plump flesh, considering and saw her eyes spark and her lips quirk when he played his role. "Then, I'll have to take my payment in trade, hmmm?" His mouth closed on her tautening nipple through the worn, thin linen of his old tunic and she sighed as he suckled the tender peak.

"Oh." Aeryn's eyes fluttered close for a second. Slim fingers held his head to her as he teased and tormented the sensitive bud. Switching to the other breast, his hand came up to rub the wet, slubbed fabric, increasing the sensations spiraling from the sensitized tip. She whispered her next line. "I throw myself on your mercy, Prince Vael. How can I...ah" her voice fractured as he kneaded and suckled again, "ah...appease you?"

"Yield." And oh, she didn't have to fake the deep shiver that ran through her at the dark velvet tone his voice took, at the heat in his eyes.

"All I am is yours, my love." Aeryn twined her arms around his neck, smoky eyes gleaming from beneath her dark lashes. He nudged her lips open and slid in, tasting her sweetness, luxuriating in the soft heat. She welcomed him without a challenge, only a soft stroke of her tongue. Not passive, no. But as close as his wild hearted lover ever came to submission. He angled and took the kiss deeper as she snuggled into his lap, eagerly kissing him back.

Breaking off, he clamped his hands around her narrow waist and rearranged her, turning her back against his chest. The tunic he slipped up over her head and he briefly considered tangling her hands in it before discarding it to the side. She let him, and let was the operative word as his hands roamed and explored her body, savoring the coiled strength, the muscle like flexing steel beneath the velvet of her skin. In one second she could spring away, but she was utterly relaxed in his possession, a sultry smile curving her lips as she dropped her head back to his shoulder. Content to let him play, now that she'd set the game.

Aeryn couldn't help but purr under his touch, draped across him like some prize, trapped between his rock hard chest and his roving hands, setting her own hands on his arms to enjoy the strength playing under his skin, reveling in the scrape of calloused fingers drawing fiery trails, setting her nerves ablaze. She'd never been the type to be passive, but Sebastian...just beneath the possessive rambling she could feel the reverence, that assured feeling he had that they were together because his Maker wanted it. She didn't know why, hadn't examined it for fear that it would evaporate under scrutiny, but it made her feel safe. And he seemed to take her willingness as a gift, and by all he held holy, she wanted to give him every gift he craved.

He spanned his hand across her belly between her hipbones, just for a moment before parting her thighs. One sensitive fingertip traced the tiny black dagger she'd gotten, following her brother into the tattooist's tent at Ostagar, intent on scolding and instead finding herself fascinated by the art and, briefly, by the artist.

So little of this time apart left to them, now. Once they got to Denerim, the planning and organization for Starkhaven would overtake them and consume Sebastian's attention. She dreaded it, the coming time when he would have to assume in earnest the mantle of Prince. He'd become less her own. Until then, though, she'd take his attention, his devotion, his utter absorption in her pleasure...and her thoughts broke off as he parted her cleft and circled her clit with unerring precision and she moaned and shifted against his cock hard and hot under her bottom.

In that rich brogue he whispered, "Your mind is wandering too far a field, _mo chridhe_." Then he kissed down from her ear to the join of her neck and shoulder, hot open mouthed kisses that promised more heat to come. He could feel it blooming under her skin. Their night vision was acute enough to see each other, but colors were vague. Yet, from memory he could see the rosy flush that was imbuing her skin as he tracked the rising heat.

She was close, now. And he lusted after it, her pleasure in a way that still surprised him. Before...before, while he was always interested in a partner's enjoyment it was only because it made his better. Now? Maker, he wanted her, but he wanted those little trophies of her orgasms more.

Well, to be honest, not _more_ , just more often.

He adjusted his hand, shifting his thumb to her clit in order to slide two fingers into that hot wet clenching sheath. Just at the edge, teasing little caresses until she strained against him, whimpering.

"Sebastian, _please_."

"Greedy, are you?"

"And well you know." Aeryn turned her face into his throat, nuzzling under his chin as he gave her what she wanted, slipping his fingers farther in, closing his eyes at the shuddering cry as he brought her just to the brink and then with a swirl of his thumb and again, again thrusting his long fingers into her slick heat, cast her over, letting the climax take her. He moved his hand ever slower, as she stiffened against him then trembled in the wake. When she slumped back he pressed her gently over, onto her stomach and lifting her hips, stuffed their pillows beneath. A wicked smile slipped across his lips as he surveyed the bounty, shifting to strip his trews off. She nearly glowed, skin dewed and pearly in the cool fading moonlight.

The twin dimples on either side of her spine, just before the ample curve of her backside began made his thumbs itch and he caressed them fondly just a moment before her sigh stirred his cock and set need beating urgently in his blood. He stroked the dark crisp hair, reigniting the sensitive flesh of her pretty, soaking cunt and eliciting her moan as she pressed back against his hand.

Laying, decadently sprawled across the bunk, arse in the air. Maker, not particularly dignified, but what could she care when Sebastian finally pressed his broad head into her, filling that nagging emptiness left even after he'd spun her that gorgeous orgasm. He was taking his bloody sweet time about it, giving her inch by inch, like heated steel. And he'd set her just at an angle that all she could do was wriggle, holding her hips just that right...oh, holy...

Sebastian's eyes closed, drowning in pleasure, as he drew out and thrust fully back, hilting his aching cock in her, causing Aeryn's back to arch as she managed to meet him and they were properly off. Locking his large hands on her hips he set and ran a punishing rhythm, long deep strokes designed to strike that spot that made her voice little urgent 'ohs' with every hit. The sound of them, of the climbing pitch and frequency, fed that inner need of his, that part of him that wanted her need, recorded it, kept it as proof.

Aeryn's hands scrabbled in the blanket and she just managed to stuff a bit of the woolen against her mouth to muffle her shriek as she came, shuddering, sparks of bliss lancing through her veins like lightning. He groaned as she clamped tight as a fist around his cock in glorious liquid heat, again and again drawing him, milking him until he came, too, blindingly, the whole of his world briefly narrowed as he spent. Sebastian collapsed over her, rasping out the lovers' words of his cradletongue into her ear, breathing deep the scent of her, almonds and salt.

They lay for a minute in the surrounding, cushioning dark, letting the chill in the air cool their skin and slow their hearts.

"I wish you wouldn't...I love to hear it, when you come, _mo chride_."

"Yes, well, Isabela made a point of reminding me yesterday, vocally and rather explicitly how thin the walls are between the cabins. People are sleeping." She wriggled underneath him and he shifted just enough to let her roll over and draw him back down.

"Ah." Well, that was…no, he didn't care to be the main event in Isabela's penchant for voyeurism. Shaking his head he prodded and rearranged her, boneless and sated, to lay curled up against him.

"Exactly." Yawning, she tangled her fingers in his hair and stroked.

"I'll be glad to get off the ship." Sebastian sighed and if there was any tension left to him after their loving, it slipped away under her touch. He ran his hand over her sweetly rounded hip and fell asleep.

-000-

Isabela came to find them in the bit of bow Aeryn had claimed as her own with a hammock, a shading tarp and a few sturdy crates lashed together. She was sitting on one, reading a batch of parchments, her newly oiled scabbards drying to one side while Sebastian sprawled at her feet on the deck, working on his bowstring.

The Captain watched them for a moment, saw Hawke reach out her hand to curl her fingers absently into the archer's hair, turned lighter, redder in the sun. He paused for a moment to lean his head back against her thigh, closing his eyes, clearly luxuriating in the petting.

"You two are disgustingly adorable, you know that, right?" Two pairs of bright eyes shifted to watch her approach and it struck her that the Choir Boy was a different man, changed since Hawke had claimed him for her own, it was true. Something too soft in him was gone and something that had been without a focus was pinned but there was a new quietude about Hawke, as well, that hadn't been there before. As if some of the coiled energy that burned in her was being redirected. It was, Isabela supposed, a result of love hard fought for. And then scoffed at herself and the romantic thought. _Must be catching, that romance shit_.

It was Sebastian who asked. "What's the news, Captain?"

"We should be making for the harbor in an hour or so. Amaranthine awaits another hour's sail in."

Aeryn grinned then. "Thank the Maker."

Isabela frowned, wondering if she should take offense. "What, you don't care for ship life?"

Rolling her eyes, Aeryn stretched and folded her papers into her pouch. "You're the sailor, Bela, not me. If I don't get some land under my feet soon, I'm like to start being a pest. I am bored and I want to go for a prowl. It's about half a day out to Vigil's Keep from the city, if I recall my geography. A good chance to stretch our legs."

Sebastian chuckled at Isabela's dismay, but he knew Aeryn wasn't joking. She'd been getting more restless by the day, her pacing aboveboard reminding him of how long it had been since she'd gone so long without a fight. There wasn't much room for sparring on the deck and the style she and Fenris preferred had been greatly restricted. She'd dueled once or twice with Isabela, but that sort of fight had little appeal for Aeryn, he knew. Too much show and taunt and not enough action. The captain had won hands down in a halfmark what would have lasted less than ten minutes had Aeryn been fighting in her normal fashion. Lethal. Direct. And while their bedplay seemed to take the edge off of her twitchiness, it wasn't quite enough, though he thought they'd done their level best. He covered the smirk that crossed his face with a casual hand. It wasn't a poor way to spend a couple of weeks, being tumbled into a bunk every time she got energetic.

"There's no accounting for taste." The pirate shrugged. "Anyway. We can stay in Amaranthine for the week, like you planned. I think we'll still have time to make it to Denerim before the winter storms really start to be a problem."

A scramble at the hatch drew their attention. Merrill popped her dark head up. "I heard a gull. Are we close?"

"That we are, kitten."

"Lovely. Oh, look!" She pointed over the rail and drew their attention to the greenish black smudge on the horizon. The elf dashed to the rail and Sebastian saw eagerness flash across Aeryn's face as she followed close behind. Varric, Fenris, and Bethany joined them.

Sebastian stood just beside and behind her at the rail, watching her face. He could almost see the memories running through her, emotions calling up old times. Love, fear, regret chased themselves across her pale features before she realized and smoothed it all away. She leaned back against him and sliding his hand over her shoulder, he looked at the coastline as it materialized. Craggy cliffs, not that different from those of the Wounded Coast. Clearly marked by brutal storms, time and heavy tide.

"It looks cold," Bethany said, a certain fond irritation in her voice. She'd never been one to complain about Kirkwall's heat.

Aeryn scanned the coastline, not quite sure what she was looking for. She'd never seen Ferelden from this angle. But still…it looked like…no. Not home. Not now. Aeryn submerged the thought. Now home was…wherever Sebastian was. She glanced at her companions before she pushed away from the rail. "C'mon. Let's go get our gear ready for a hike. I'll tell Anders."

Fenris frowned at her. "Will you keep him drugged?"

She felt Sebastian's hand tighten, probably involuntarily on her shoulder. "I'd prefer not. I'd really rather not have to hire a wagon and team to haul him. We'll just have to trust in our ability to control him."

They broke apart, then, each headed to their respective cabins to pull their packs together.

Sebastian and Aeryn were quiet as they packed. He squeezed her elbow, briefly realizing she was considering their approach. Possible, too, that she was setting her thoughts in order about letting Anders go. She quirked a half-smile up at him and tipped her head towards the passageway.

Aeryn let Sebastian linger at the door, while she spoke again to Anders, soothing her archer's over protective side. "It's time." She'd brought the mage a plain set of robes, only minimally spelled and tossed them to him.

He didn't bother to catch them. He just looked at them dully for a minute, and then leaned over to pick them up from the floor. Ander's lank golden brown hair swung by his jaw. "Um. My staff?"

She cocked an eyebrow at him. "You're kidding. What a perfect time to redevelop a sense of humor. Go on with yourself." The mage's jaw tightened at the dry tone, but he nodded and went to strip. He paused, one long pale finger on the latches of his pauldrons, when Aeryn lingered.

"Can I have a moment?"

"Sure. Come up when you're ready. Bring your gear." Falsely sweet, Aeryn pushed the pack forward; she'd had Bethany go it through very carefully, looking for…anything Anders might use to escape. She turned on her heel, wishing hard that she didn't mourn the old camaraderie that she'd once shared with the apostate mage. Sebastian looked at her face, carefully blank and sighed inwardly. He pressed his hand to the small of her back and she let him steer her towards the hatch.

The ship sailed up the inlet and towards the bustling port, following the lanes that buoys clearly marked. It was just before noon, the water sparkling under a chilly autumn sun.

While the Amaranthine dockside wasn't hugely different from Kirkwall's, the lack of Tevinter influence and a more energetic buzz made for a lighter atmosphere. The apathy that plagued the city of chains had no counterpart here. It was cleaner, too, in a subtle way. Well, anyway, there weren't any bloating dead bodies floating near the boats that Aeryn could see. Pleasant change, that.

Isabela called out several orders and mates clawed down sails. The _Siren's Call II_ came to a graceful fullstop and, chain groaning, the anchor plummeted into the water with a splash. "Nicely done, Captain!" Someone called from the dock and Isabela gave a jaunty wave.

Aeryn glanced over her merry band, all armed and ready for their coming trek. She pushed away from the rail, meaning to disembark and then…Sebastian saw her pause and then look back at them from the head of the gangway, alarm and consternation full in her gaze. "What is it, then?"

She blinked and waved her hand, before covering her face. "Oh, sodding Void. I'm an _idiot_."

"Hawke?" Fenris and Sebastian exchanged concerned glances as Aeryn shook her head and moaned.

"Look at us. Just look at us. We can't...This isn't Kirkwall. No one's going to just wave us past…oh, that's just Hawke's mad band. Maker. If they're looking for us…" She had an insane urge to giggle. "Heya, Bob. I'm looking for that bunch that took out the Gallows. Well, gee, Templar Daveth, what do they look like? Oh, you know…elves, mages, dwarf with all the swagger. Pirate with the tits and no pants. Tall gorgeous fellow that walks about in bright white armor. That one carries a giant broadsword and oh, yeah, his tattoos light up. All led by that utterly daft madwoman…Oh, right. Isn't that them right there? Right you are, Bob!"

"Who's Bob?" Merrill asked a bemused Varric, wide eyed at Hawke's abnormal babbling.

"Ya know, Daisy, I think it's possibly her invisible friend. Always knew she had one."

"He doesn't seem to be very helpful. If he's telling a Templar about us, and all."

Sebastian stepped up, trying not to smile, and laid his hands on her shoulders, shook her, just a touch. " _Leannan_? Breathe, alright?" She dropped her hand and looked up at him with wide eyes before hauling in a calming breath. He was right. Being dramatic wasn't going to help.

Nodding, she shrugged away from him. "I just wasn't thinking. I'm so used to folks not noticing us. We were just going to waltz into the city, stride through and off to Vigil's Keep. We've no idea if they're looking for us. And…Maker. Look at us. There's no way for us to duck notice. Void."

Bethany glanced her companions over. "Sister. We could go cloaked. It is fairly cold, we wouldn't attract any more notice. There are several people on the docks in full winter cloaks already."

Aeryn shot a look over the quay. Bethany was right. She wouldn't have chanced it, walking around so encumbered in Kirkwall, but with any luck there weren't random hordes of bandits lining the streets of Amaranthine. She nodded. "Cloaks it is, then."

Even swathed in the winter gear, they still drew glances and one or two outright stares. Mercenary bands clearly weren't as common in Amaranthine as they had been in the Marches. Sebastian shifted. In leathers and armor, he'd been warm enough. The cloak was too much. If his armor was this much of a problem for Aeryn's peace of mind, he'd have to look out a replacement sooner than later. But…they'd left Kirkwall before she could sell the estate. Money was likely to become an issue, too.

Aeryn saw Merrill edge closer to Varric, who reached out to pat her while he scanned the area. The elf was definitely feeling eyes on her. Fenris had his hackles raised. He too, had gotten used to being, if not ignored, then, a common sight. Aeryn resisted the urge to shift her shoulders and draw back to Sebastian. Or duck into shadows and leave the others to fend for themselves. Anders, walking in the midst of their loose circle, head down and hunched in on himself, Sebastian, used to observation in the Chantry, and Bethany from recent years in the Gallows seemed oblivious to the watchers. Sighing, she stuck her nose into the wind. The slight scent of dog made her lips tip up.

On the outer gate, there was a framed notice posted that made her smile outright. _By Order of King Alistair Theirin. Safe passage is granted to all mages in the Kingdom of Ferelden and the Arling of Amaranthine otherwise abiding by the laws of said territories. Any harming innocents, practicing blood magic or demonic liaison will be dealt with summarily and with extreme prejudice._ It was signed by Alistair and the Warden Commander, Arlessa of Amaranthine, Meriden Caron.

At least she didn't have to worry about Bethany. She dropped back to Merrill. "Let's keep a lid on the…"

Merrill nodded, cutting her off. "Yes, I will. Don't worry, Hawke. I…haven't been. Since…" Since they'd had to fight their way past her clan. Aeryn squeezed her arm and up again to walk beside Sebastian and Fenris.

Isabela gave a high sign and peeled off towards the dockside offices. She'd get whatever permits were needed and had spoken of picking up another crew member or two.

Sebastian watched her go. He'd asked her to find a cook. He wanted Aeryn spelled from that monotonous duty, now that they were in Ferelden waters. Glancing down, he took up his love's hand and tightened his fingers, fondly. "It seems to be fine."

The inner gate loomed, with its guard. "Let's not count our chickens." Fenris grunted in agreement.

The city guardsman who confronted them was neatly turned out and efficient looking. His shield and sword gleamed with obvious care. Aveline would be appreciative, Aeryn thought fondly of her missing companion. He didn't lift his face guard before he spoke, with appropriate caution when meeting a well armed troop.

He spoke with assured authority, in a warm Fereldan accent. "Amaranthine is a peaceful city. If you and your associates are looking to make a name for yourself, this is not the place, ser." The guard addressed Aeryn, who had shifted to point.

She spoke and it startled Sebastian to hear the softer vowels of her own Fereldan accent bleed through far more than they ever had in Kirkwall. It suited her low musical voice. "Definitely not looking for trouble, Guardsman. My friends and I have clean business in your city and out in the countryside and then we'll be sailing out." She paused and shrugged. "Although, if there are jobs for willing hands, I'd not find directions to the Chantry Board amiss."

He gave them a once over and pushed back his faceguard, revealing an older man, with a calico beard and dark brown eyes. "Well, now. You do look willing enough, at that. Chantry is up the stairs to the west side of the city. There's a town board up in the merchant quarter, as well." Tipping his head, he added, "Redcliffe, is it?"

Aeryn grinned. "Once upon a time. Been a few years, though. You're local?"

"Yup, Amaranthine born and raised." He seemed to be weighing something. It was a slow enough day on the dockgate. "Well, you lot look to be up to it. There's a couple of merchants looking for company out to the Vigil and mercenary companies are a little sparse right now. There's been 'spawn sighted between here and there pretty often this last sennight. Warden Commander's had her hands full with a breached tunnel down south and we haven't wanted to bother her, but it's going to have to be dealt with. That'd be a pretty lucrative job if you're headed that direction, anyway."

She seemed to weigh the idea. "Hadn't thought to go out that far. But- good coin?" The guardsman nodded. "My thanks, Ser…"

"Oswald."

Aeryn flashed him a charming smile. "Oswald." Sebastian tried not to chafe at her mild flirting. She was just easing the way and it was working, the guardsman seemed a little dazed. Sebastian sympathized.

"You'll find 'em at the Crown and Lion- not far from the Chantry." She sketched the man a courtly bow and he grinned. "Just you stay out of trouble, mistress, and I think you'll like Amaranthine."

Wide eyes. "Do I look the sort who would cause trouble, Oswald?"

"You look the sort trouble likes." He winked and she chuckled and waved as she turned in the direction he'd indicated, leaving them to follow.

A few steps past the gateyard, she grinned saucily up at Sebastian who had returned to her side. "Well, that's handy."

"Yes, you charmed him completely, _Mistress_." She sideswiped him with her shoulder and he slid his hand down to the small of her back, glad to see her more relaxed.

"You seem pretty happy about getting chatted up by the local guard, Hawke." Varric's brow was wrinkled with concern.

"Kirkwallers." Aeryn shook her head. "Law and order is a _good_ thing, Varric. If the guard has enough time to be warning off troublemakers and a sharp enough eye to know how to use mercs, then it's a solid sign that Ferelden is getting back to normal. That King Alistair is doing well by his rule. Kirkwall was dysfunctional, remember?"

"I remember it made it easier to hide the bodies."

"I just got permission to run jobs, I don't _have_ to hide the bodies."

"Are we really going to guard the merchants?"

"No. Well…maybe. Depends on what they're selling." Aeryn tried to explain what she'd decided while she walked. "I'd been thinking to try and keep a low profile…at least until we heard what word had spread, but there's no point. We're all of us too distinctive. If we're being hunted…well, better to engender some good will among the right people, 'til we get to Denerim and see what Alistair thinks of us." She glanced up at Sebastian and an almost shy look crossed her face. "I thought you and Beth might like to attend Chant while we're here. I figured you could do that while the rest of us took the lay of the land. We can meet you back at the market in a mark or two."

Anders coughed and spoke, rustily, "They'll know me, maybe. At the tavern and the Chantry."

Aeryn nodded without looking at him. "Pull up your hood. Don't talk."

The bells were ringing as they came to the steps and the groups separated. Sebastian understood he was meant to see what news was being spread in the Chantry, but Aeryn was right, he missed his devotions, still. Aeryn leaned against him briefly before she peeled away to the tavern. "Be safe. Don't be too long." He watched her stride away, cloak swirling. She was trusting him with her sister's care. It was almost heady, in a way, though he was under no illusions that Bethany required his protection.

The Chantry of Our Redeemed Lady was a beautiful timberframed structure- low slung and built of dwarven quarried grey stone that caught sparks in the shifting light. It was a far more earthbound building than the Tevinter structure in Kirkwall or the more ornate Orlesian inspired Chantries of Starkhaven, but Sebastian felt the pervading peace reach for him in the incense. Bethany, too, sighed softly beside him, clearly finding the atmosphere soothing. A quick glance showed no sign of any troublesome heavy Templar presence. In fact, with the exception of the guard at the door and two at the Mother's office, there weren't any.

The alcoves were empty, confession would wait until after the verses were sung, but the nave was well filled with worshippers. Many were cloaked, he and Bethany didn't stand out unduly. They'd both stashed their weapons, bow and staff under specially cut folds in the cloaks, unwilling to be unarmed, even here. Sebastian had known Aeryn wouldn't approve, not without one of the others, those who wouldn't be chanting, to keep an eye out. It was why, in the old days, she'd always attended with her mother and Bethany. She watched while they worshipped. And when he protested, she reminded him of the ambushes she'd walked into while in the protection of the Chantry.

Here, though, the peace of the Maker prevailed.

It wasn't quite perfect. No, someday he hoped Aeryn would be the one slipping to her knees beside him. But if it never happened at her instigation, he would never push. He allowed himself to be pulled into the words of the third verse of Transfigurations and let Aeryn's constant presence in his heart subside until he returned to her.

\---000---

Aeryn turned just at the corner of the stairwell and watched Sebastian guide her sister up the stairs and away up the landing. It had been weeks since they'd been more than a deck apart from each other. But he needed the cleansing that the Chant provided for him as much as she needed a fight to blow the cobwebs away. He was always lighter when he came back, more centered. Hopefully, it would be the same at any Chantry.

Fenris tipped his head, towards the tavern, with its gaudy sign swinging in the fresh breeze. She nodded and followed and then hesitated, again.

It had been on the tip of her tongue to ask Orana to run to the market with Sandal this morning, when it occurred to her that her servants were no longer with her and she was spoiled. Years of having three servants with only her to coddle had made her life immeasurably easier. In Kirkwall, she'd have sent Orana to the market for those little items, soap and new bootlaces, tedious to shop for, while she herself took care of business at the tavern. While she'd done it before, always tried to be self sufficient, truth was her time had been devoted to other less domestic tasks. And now she would have to carve out the time. She especially needed to seek out the apothecary.

The others were at the tavern door and she trotted to catch up.


	2. Chapter 2

The Crown and Lion was a comfortable public house, tables and chairs scattered, well patronized, appetizing smells emanating from the kitchen. There was the normal boozy smell, but it was a solid building and reasonably clean. “Looks expensive,” Varric gruffed.

 

“They cannot all be rotting, crumbling sties, you know.” Fenris gave Varric a bit of a jibe and Aeryn smiled to hear it.

 

“See anyone that looks prosperous and merchantish?” She steered Merrill towards a table in the corner closest to the kitchen and farthest from the door, tipping her head to indicate that Anders should sit between her and Fenris against the wall.

 

Varric went to order their usual drinks and returned after a minute of chatting with the barkeep. He pulled out a small ledger. “He says that there’s a couple of merchants staying who like to eat elevenses here.”

 

Aeryn nodded. “They ought to be along soon enough, then.” The drinks came courtesy of a pale haired slender barmaid who smiled friendly enough and Aeryn swallowed a mouthful, savoring the smooth crisp cider. She’d missed it. Bodahn hadn’t been able to pack her usual quaff, too heavy to carry. She ducked her head to hide a smirk as Fenris sniffed at the tumbler of red wine he’d picked up and sipped cautiously. Finicky elf.

 

Varric shook his head, flipping through the ledger. "While we’re here, Hawke, I ought to make contact with the local Guild. I want to see if your account is up to date. Maybe transfer a little more to Denerim.”

 

“Sure. You might pull a little gold. I don’t want to be caught short and we could all do with some gear. Will it be a long drawn out thing?” Dwarves liked a bit of ceremony at times.

 

“Nah. Should just be a matter of showing ‘em the Kirkwall Guildmarks and our seals.” She fished her own, a heavy carved brass ring, out of her small pouch and slid it across the table. Varric palmed it and tipped his ale towards her.

 

“Give me your list and I’ll pick your stuff up while I get mine. That way we aren’t slowed down, too much.” They drank for a few minutes, Varric making a small list of items he needed.

 

A dark, heavy man in a brocade doublet came down the stairs, preceded by a better built well armed fellow, likely a guard. Another, wearing a simpler outfit, but still quality, followed a few paces behind. They sat at a small table by the fire and the barmaid brought them drinks as if it were a standard order, but she did it without the smile that had accompanied their own drinks. “That would seem to be our merchants.” Fenris spoke in a quiet rumble pitched below the hum of the other patrons. “Are we going to make a bid for their caravan?”

 

She looked them over. Prosperous enough. But they looked hard around the edges, tight fisted and sullen. Maybe just a matter of being forced to slow their lucrative trade, but she didn’t really want to be at someone’s beck and call without good reason. Shaking her head, she replied, “No. I think we’ll just plow the road ahead of them. We can take care of the problem, I think. Doing that should earn us some points with the local authorities, even if we don’t play nursemaid to the merchants. Better even, because it makes it clear we're not just out for easy coin.”  
.”

 

Anders coughed and Aeryn shot him a glance. “What?”

 

“The guard said darkspawn.”

 

“Right. Everyone here’s fought them. Except Sebastian.” Aeryn shifted in her seat at the thought, taking a deep drink. She didn’t want him anywhere near darkspawn. But she could imagine exactly what would come of her trying to make him stay behind.

 

Shaking his head, the mage continued, “It’s just…they’re different here, sometimes. Sometimes they’re smart. I told you once, we fought some that could talk, Hawke. It makes them more dangerous.”

 

“I also thought you said you thought the Warden Commander wiped out all of the smart ones.”

 

“As far as I know, yes. But…it’s been a long time, I don’t know. Things could have changed.”

 

“You can still…” she waved her hands around, vaguely, “sense them, right?”

 

“Yes.” Shortly. His eyes on the table tracing a whorled knot in the scarred dark wood. 

 

"Well, we have to go that way. And so we will."

 

Her eyes were cool on him. He could feel the weight of her gaze, a trace of lingering hurt. He had a choice. He could go with Hawke, let her take him back to the Wardens. To that slow death. Or he could fight and be free of them, here in Ferelden where he could blend in, just another apostate mage taking advantage of King Alistair's hospitality. Or possibly die quickly. She wouldn't hesitate again, if he was a threat to her and hers. He didn't delude himself that he could count himself in that group, any longer.

 

Anders could remember sitting in this tavern, mocking Nathaniel for his reserve, listening to Oghren's drunken ramblings about the Hero and then trying and failing miserably to drink him under the table. Playing with Sir Pounce-a-lot, watching Meridan's sweet smile as she surreptitiously fed the cat tiny nibbles of fish under the table. There were echoes here, of companionship and good memories. And then Meridan had gone off to chase a legend for King Alistair, a rumor about the witch, Morrigan, and the Templars she'd brought into the ranks had closed around Anders, without her to shield him. The letters from Karl. The offer from Justice.

 

He wasn't sure he could stand to see Meridan's disapproval. Mage though she was, she had been as devout a woman as he’d ever met. As sincere in her faith as Sebastian Vael, in her way. She would hate him for what he'd done in the name of the mages' cause. He swallowed down the rest of his ale, trying to drink down the bitter choke in his throat.

 

The barmaid lingered by their table, hoping for a lunch order as their drinks dwindled. Aeryn chatted with her, but the girl didn't seem to have any interest in matters beyond the Waking Sea. Her gossip was full of what the girls were wearing this year, whether or not the King would come to see the Warden Commander this year as usual or...oh, whether or not the Queen was truly pregnant. Anders looked shocked at that and Aeryn recalled that he'd told her Wardens were usually infertile. _Oh, Alistair._ Aeryn gave it some thought, though and realized she couldn’t judge from the outside, on one evening’s acquaintance. Possibly the baby was welcome as sunshine. The barmaid wandered off then, taking Aeryn's empty tumbler back to the kitchen and Aeryn pondered her, thinking of Sarai and Caleb, and the fate of the woman she had befriended back in Kirkwall.

 

Fenris felt more than saw Aeryn's mood shift as the serving girl left them. Her pale eyes tracked the slight figure and he could see bleakness gathering. He considered for a moment. Ah. Yes. The barmaid Hawke had hired for Corff.

 

He leaned back in his chair, waiting for her to catch his eye in query. She did, a question now on her face as if she expected that he'd heard something. "You are not responsible for Sarai's fate, Hawke. She had a better life after knowing you than before. If it ended at the Chantry, at least her son has some benefit of education."

 

Anders stiffened between them. He'd known Sarai, too, had healed her boy, Caleb, and taken an interest in them. He hadn't realized she might have been a worshipper that morning. He hunched further over his pint.

 

Fenris' gentle reminder cut through Aeryn's doldrums. He was right, though she couldn't help but worry about young Caleb. Nodding, she quirked up the corner of her lips and turned to Merrill and asked her opinion of the city, encouraging the elf to ramble and cover their quiet.

 

Varric took a turn around the room and the upper loft, but there were no rumblings about the Kirkwall Chantry or Hawke's crew amongst the other patrons. Provincial Ferelden, with little interest in the broader world that thought of them as a backwater. Let Thedas take care of itself, if Ferelden had to do the same. It seemed the old attitude had crystallized further since they'd quelled a Blight unaided. Aeryn had to bite back a fond smile as they slipped out of the tavern and back into the street.

 

The market was full of shoppers, bartering and gossiping with the shopkeepers. It was less formal and far better stocked than Kirkwall's merchant square, open shoptables running the length of the street. Aeryn made a little show of going over the merchant's board, in case word got back to Oswald. And she supposed, it wouldn't hurt to see if there were one or two small things they could accomplish along the way. Fenris stuck to Anders' side, while Aeryn and Merrill shopped and Varric drifted off to make contact with the Guild. She gave her partner a high sign when she ducked into the apothecary, wanting to finish that errand quickly.

 

She had a list of the herbs she needed. But it would be so much easier if the...ah. Man. Wonderful. Well, he still might have some of the women's tea she needed compounded. Between Elegant and Anders, she never even had to ask for the prophylactic drink in Kirkwall. And for years, she drank it only on the off chance. But now that she and Sebastian were so enthusiastically occupied... Yeah. She needed to make sure she was clear of pregnancy a while longer. She schooled her features, cool and composed and approached the counter.

"Welcome to .....how can I serve you?" The apothecary was a slight man with thinning hair and a stoop. She gave him a brisk smile and plunked down her list. 

"Well, ser, I'm in need of a few items." He pulled it close to his nose, peering near-sightedly at her neat script.

"There's no problem, for most of these here. But, young woman, I'm afraid I don't recognize these two items." Her sun cream didn't surprise her. That had been a special blend of Father's that she and Bethany and then Elegant had had to rediscover once in Kirkwall. Aeryn didn't let her smile drift over the tea, either. This was a problem in Ferelden. Only mages regularly had access to such potions and teas. And she really would prefer to keep Bethany out of it.

It was possible, though that he was just being prudish, so she pushed. "I'm a grown woman, ser. I only wish to make my purchase, pay my coin and leave your shop." Intact. You as well. But, she didn't even try to sound threatening. Sebastian would be proud of her. 

He eyed her for a short moment and then shrugged. "As you say, but I'm sorry. I haven't any such thing." And maybe he was telling her the truth. He blinked at her, myopically. "Do you want the other compounds?"

She sighed and handed over the list of ingredients. "And these as well. I hope you have _them_ ," she added just a little sourly. He read down the list and nodded as he started to pull out small boxes and flasks. Void, she'd have to get Bethany to make it up, after all. And in a significant quantity, if Merrill and Isabela might find themselves in need as well.

The little man told her he'd have her list filled in about half a mark, so Aeryn went to finish her other shopping, keeping an eye on Fenris and Anders at the far end of the street, Merrill looking at leathergoods. Knife oil and bootlaces. A new whetstone. A few poison ingredients. And...she caught a whiff of incense and some other faintly familiar fragrance and looked up.

"Might I carry your basket, then, m'lady?" She turned and smiled up into Sebastian's handsome face, the warming blaze of his blue, blue eyes.

>>>\----- >

He and Bethany had lingered after the sermon, words of comfort in turbulent times. It was clear that news of Kirkwall had reached Amaranthine, there was a small shrine with a separate set of candles being maintained for the sole purpose of prayer for the victims, the names of Grand Cleric Elthina and the other clergy listed on a scroll. He was glad to see his name omitted; at least he wouldn't be falsely mourned. His withdrawal of vows and dispensation must have cleared, then. But the shrine wasn't being mobbed with grievers, three weeks now after the event. Sebastian had lit his candles at the normal altar as had Bethany. He heard her whisper a prayer for Cullen and added his own, to be rewarded with a half-smile. 

They reconnoitered, in guise of exploring the Chantry as tourists, listening in on quiet murmurs, the various conversations of the parishioners. Condemnation of the mage that had committed the deed, but no name. No suspicion of accomplices. Little mention of the events at the Gallows, just an old woman praying for a son who had been there. Sebastian wondered, mage or Templar. The lack of chatter about the other people involved in the Gallows’ decimation would ease Aeryn's worry, he hoped. 

Sebastian hesitated when he saw two elder mothers enter the alcoves on either side of the nave, plainly readying themselves for hearing confession. He glanced up at the gentle face of Andraste and considered. Confession and reconciliation was meant to be confidential, but clergy were human. Even the best of them occasionally shared stories, gossiped. It was possible that in confessing, he might be exposing the group to retribution. He didn't know these women, and...no, he couldn't chance it. He would like to indulge, but Aeryn's need to keep a low profile trumped his need to unburden himself. The Maker knew. Knew his uncertainties and his weaknesses. It had to be enough, just now. 

Bethany had not even looked towards the confessionals. After receiving the Mother's blessing they left the peace of the sanctuary and Sebastian had to ask. "Do you no longer confess, then, Lady Bethany?" He had taken hers more than once in their first year in Kirkwall, though he now realized that she'd been hiding a larger secret than the small sins she'd given voice to. 

"Just Bethany, unless you want me to call you Prince Vael and have my sister mock us." 

"Bethany, then.," he corrected himself with a slight chuckle. They reached the street level and turned towards the merchant quarter. 

She considered the man beside her for a moment. Her sister's lover. Her beloved. She'd seen them together now, seen the difference in Aeryn with this man beside her, seen the way they looked at each other, spoke with one another. She wanted to get to know him better, if she'd be calling him brother someday. "I stopped after going to the Gallows. It seemed...pointlessly dangerous. The Maker was aware of my faults and I was worried it would be used against me. I guess I'm out of the habit now." She glanced at him out of the corner of her eye, noticing how warily he scanned the crowd before they approached, the way he used his height to clear a path slightly before her. Walking with her sister had given the former priest a new set of skills, it seemed. "And you?" 

He rubbed his chin, a little sheepish. "I attended a few days before...we left. I had intended to go that morning, but something made me go with Aeryn, instead. It seems dangerous now, to me as well. Like you, I expect the Maker has my full measure." 

She was about to ask him if he ever regretted it, leaving the Maker's service to be with Aeryn, when the archer paused, his eyes brightening, catching sight of something. He turned slightly, started forward and then stopped, recalling Bethany's presence. 

"If I might?" He indicated a small flowerstand on the edge of the market street and Bethany trailed him, curious. He looked over the plants, bright and fresh, clearly at a loss. He brushed rose petals, pink and fragrant, and daisies, white and sunny. Probably among the last flowers of the Ferelden autumn, before the freeze set in. 

The little maid attending looked up hopefully. It didn't look like the practical folk of Amaranthine were in a flower-minded mood but this tall fellow and his pretty lady might be. "Something for your lady, ser?" 

Sebastian really had no idea what he was looking for. Just...he was reminded that he'd never yet brought Aeryn flowers. In all honesty, never given her a gift, never foundthe right thing to give her, never the right moment. And he wanted to. Wanted to practice giving her things. "Bethany? Does Aeryn like flowers, at all?" 

She blinked her lovely soft brown eyes up at him. And then perused the stand. Flowers. For her bone-practical sister. It boggled the mind, really. Bethany had dreamed of roses from a lover but Aeryn had mocked endlessly the softhearted gifts of her swains in attempt to keep them at a distance. But…oh, when they were little...Bethany could remember Aeryn running ahead of them on a family walk. Tripping, falling down a hill and...fearless, merry-hearted Aeryn, tumbling into a fairyring of violets and whispering in rapturous delight with her discovery. Father and Mother laughing softly at her falling head-first into treasure. Carver had once made it a point to hunt down the earliest violets of the year for Aeryn's early spring nameday. 

Her eyes lighted on a small bunch, pale purple and white, the stems wrapped in the heart-shaped leaves and tied with a gray satin ribbon. "Those. Aeryn used to love violets." 

A delighted smile played on the archer's lips. "Truly?" Small, sweet violets. Delicate and shy of the sun. It somehow surprised him not at all. He dropped the coppers in the flowergirl's grimy little hand and, having seen the way Bethany's eyes had lingered on the roses, pulled one from the cart and handed it to his future sister-in-law. He gave the girl the coin for that, as well, and took Bethany's arm. She breathed in the rich fragrance as they walked. 

"Why?" 

"For thanks. And because I imagine Cullen regretted not being able to." He yet recalled the look on the Templar's face in the moment just after the battle, frantic to see if Bethany was whole. 

"He did, actually." She pulled a long gold chain from the neck of her robes. It was weighted with a glass pendant, in which was embedded one perfect rose petal, a keepsake with the unmistakable shimmer of magic. "But, thank you, Sebastian. It's kind of you." 

He nodded and she watched his face shift as he scanned the crowd, back to the hunter looking for trouble. Aristocratic, high cheekbones. Blade of a nose. Hooded, crystal blue eyes. He could seem cold and forbidding, terribly intense when he wasn't smiling. He did generally wear a slight smile, though, rendering him gentle. And, so, watching him, she saw when he caught sight of her sister, shopping in the bustling street. 

She almost blushed to see it and thereby answered her own question. No. Sebastian Vael didn't regret leaving the Maker's service. Not at all. 

>>>\----- >

Anders was making Fenris nervous. Admittedly, he was always uncomfortable around the abomination, always expecting a betrayal. But this was new, the gleam in his eye as he surveyed the town, the crowded street, the various venues of escape. If he was going to make a move, it would be here. He was more familiar than they with this city, he might have knowledge of passages and alleys. Once upon a time he'd been adept at escape. Fenris wished suddenly he hadn't let Hawke get so far away. 

He was about to catch her eye when Anders took the opportunity to speak, in a snide insinuating tone. "I've always wondered, Fenris. How did your master use those lyrium tattoos of yours?" 

Fenris fixed him with a glare. "That is of no concern of yours, mage." 

"Hawke told me not to ask. So I never did. Sad, really. Her good little pets and neither one of us ever got what we wanted, did we?" 

"You are mistaken if you believe this is something I will discuss with you." 

Glancing at the almost defensive elf, Anders pushed, "Still hers, even though she's going to run off with her prince and leave you in the dust? Pathetic." He was still trying to get a rise, maybe to put Fenris off balance. With that, Anders thought, he might be able to get a jump on them, duck down the passage to his left. 

Enough. "Mage, I never wanted more from Hawke than what she gave freely." He arched one eyebrow and smirked. "What is pathetic is that you, who were summarily turned down, never moved on." 

Anders blanched. "She told you..." 

"There is little Hawke and I do not know about one another and you would do well to remember it." His sharp features softened just a touch and Anders followed his glance and realized he had lost his moment. Hawke _might_ miss him with a thrown knife at this distance. Her archer would not. Vael was greeting Hawke and she smiled sweetly up at him. 

>>>\----- >

"What've you got?" Sebastian had his hand behind his back. Bethany had drifted off with Merrill a stall down to look at belts. 

"I..ah." Suddenly he felt a bit foolish. They were about to trek off into the heart of Ferelden to deliver the abomination to his fate and he was giving her flowers to carry. _Maker, help me._

Aeryn watched a flush creep up his neck, fascinated. What was he up to? He pulled his hand out and she recognized the scent. 

Violets. 

She blinked, nonplussed. The scent wreathed around her, dragging her back to her childhood. To fairyrings and little brothers and soft, innocent things that she'd long ago given up as not for the likes of her. There had been no violets in Kirkwall, as if the ground itself was too soaked in blood for something as pure as a small, shy flower. 

Here she was back in Ferelden less than a day and somewhere Sebastian found violets. 

"Aeryn?" There was worry in his voice as though he was afraid he'd made a misstep. She took the posy, breathing in the sweetness, and then setting her hand against his chest, stretched up to kiss him. He curled his fingers around hers and pressed his forehead down to hers, just for a moment. 

Yes, he thought he’d have to be generous with his love tokens, if this softness was the result.

Whispering around the emotion lodged in her throat, Aeryn thanked him, "My very favorite. Thank you, love." She tucked the flowers into a loop on her belt. They would wilt, but nothing for it, she regretted. 

Fenris herded Anders back to them and she led the way down to the armor smith. She'd hoped to at least find Sebastian something new, although in honesty Fenris could use a new kit-out as well. While there was an exotic and eclectic collection, nothing particularly suited either of the men and she couldn't see laying out coin in the hopes that the craftsman could get what they wanted. The leather merchant was equally unhelpful, but Merrill had made a small purchase. 

"Hawke, let me." She indicated the little bunch of flowers and when Aeryn handed it over, wrapped the now-spelled little deerskin pouch she'd bought around the stems and filled it from her waterskin. "Old Keeper's trick for keeping herbs fresh. Marethari taught me. They're so pretty, it's a shame to let them fade." 

Aeryn tugged a lovelock of Merrill's dark hair and kissed her cheek. "Thanks, Kitten." She tucked the posy back into the loop of her belt and Sebastian smiled fondly at Merrill, who gave him a tight smile before she ducked her head. 

"I'm glad to be back, too. This is nothing like Kirkwall." Her voice held a little trace of bitterness. If only Marethari hadn't... well, nothing to be done about that, now, was there? No. Not a thing. 

 

Varric caught them up and Aeryn led the way down the street, ducking back into the apothecary to pick up her purchase. Bethany glanced at the basket of packaged herbs when she returned, eyes wide at the various ingredients. "What's all this?" 

"I have to restock my poisons and I need some more sun cream compounded. The apothecary didn't recognize the formula." Aeryn was nonchalant, but Bethany looked at the contents again. She saw what she'd need for the cream, but some of the others were more esoteric. What sorts of poison had her sister picked up in the intervening years? 

"Alright. But it'll have to wait till we're back aboard ship. I don't like to concoct out in the dirt." 

"That's fine. I have enough left." 

Varric tapped his belt pouch, indicating he'd done what he set out to. No sense talking about gold out where all the city and its inevitable pickpockets could hear. Aeryn looked about and ... yes. Prosperous and happy or no, every city had its urchins out looking for a bit of extra coin. She waved over a likely looking girl, wiry and dark haired with sharp, black eyes. "Ser?" 

"Can you run a message to the docks? Quick with no detours?" 

The girl squared her thin shoulders and brushed her shock of hair in a mocking salute. "Yes'm. It'll cost you a silver, though." 

"I'll pay it if you think you're worth it." Generosity bred loyalty among small folk, if you could catch them before they got distrustful. Old habit made her ask, "Can you read?" 

She looked scornful. "Course I can. What do I look, slow?" Aeryn bit her lip. The Chantry here still taught all the children they could corral. She felt Sebastian's eyes on her, watching. Curious. Shrugging, she pulled out a bit of paper, scribbled a note to let Isabela know that things were going well and that she could expect them back in 5 days. The pirate hadn't wanted to leave her ship that long in a strange port. Plus, this way she could watch their backs, run the _Siren_ up the coast if need be, to pick them up if trouble looked likely. They'd arranged a secondary site in a cove the pirate recalled from smuggling days. She kept it concise and vague, though, in case the girl tried to read it to sell the information. 

"What's your name?" She made a final notation, to let Isabela know who the messenger was and what the girl expected in recompense. 

"Macie." 

"Well, Macie. Here's the note and five coppers. You get the silver upon delivery. Deal?" Aeryn stuck her hand out and stayed still under the observant once over. Apparently deciding that Aeryn was on the level, Macie spit in her own hand and shook. Aeryn grinned and Sebastian had to hide a smile at the near-twin roguish grin the messenger returned, charmingly lighting her foxish little face. Kind recognized kind, apparently. 

She had started off and then turned back, reassessing the group. "You a sharper?" Macie asked, curious. 

Aeryn lifted an eyebrow and answered warily. "I've been known to lift a thing or two. Why?" Void. No, the last thing she needed was an _apprentice._

"I was wantin' to..." Aeryn cut her off, but gently. 

"Deliver the message, Macie. I'm not sure I'll be back in town, alright?" The girl looked obstinate, but then turned and shot off towards the waterfront. Aeryn watched her weave between the shoppers, hitting all the right holes, never bumping into a single person. Good eye. Quick. Likely. She shook herself at Sebastian's touch on her elbow. Maker, what was she thinking? 

"You considering a helper, Hawke?" Varric nodded towards the direction Macie had disappeared. 

"No." Aeryn shook her head. "I'm not about to lead another down my path, Varric." The girl had looked at her and seen a thief and a killer, without a doubt. 

"She's just going to find someone else. Someone who..." Sebastian saw Aeyrn's glare and startled when she turned away into the crowd, cutting Varric off and finding a gap almost as easily as the little girl had. Fenris grumped and turned Anders after her and the others trailed along. Sebastian glanced back, but Macie was long gone, even to his sharp eyes. 

Catching up, he asked. "What's a 'sharper,' then?" He hadn't recognized the slang, guessing it to be a Fereldan term. 

Aeryn answered without looking at him, scanning the lane before them and turning down a quieter residential pass-through to the southern edge of town. "A cutthroat thief. A sharp who scarpers." 

"And you think the girl will just find another to teach her?" he asked Varric, who shrugged as he avoided the splash of a bucket thrown over the upper railing of one of the comfortably leaning wooden houses. 

"We picked it up somewhere, right? And she had the look about her, little and quick. There's a thief guild here same as anywhere and she'll fall into it sooner or later, if I had to hazard a guess. She's probably already running for someone. Hawke here just looked like a better option." He smirked. "We all thought so. We're well-fed, well-armed. Macie just figured we must be doing all right." 

"I'm not running a foundling's home, Varric. You were all adults." Aeryn spoke bluntly. Sebastian glanced at her face. She was carefully blank, not allowing whatever it was she was feeling to show. Something about the girl's question had bothered her. 

Sighing, he changed the subject. He’d give her space for the moment, but he wanted to know, later. "It's a half-day to Vigil's Keep?" 

Aeryn shot him a grateful glance out of the corner of her eye. "Six hours, give or take. Depends on what we find along the road. We could make it tonight, without interference, but I'm not going to count on it. March today until an hour before dark and then pick up in the morning is our best bet." 

"And the darkspawn?" Sebastian repressed a shudder. He’d never encountered the blighted creatures, though he knew Aeryn and the others had met them on Sundermount and, of course, in the Deep Roads. He echoed the prayer he had made at the Chantry, _Holy Andraste, protect us from darkness on our path._

Aeryn paused before she answered and a new note in her voice took him aback. "We have an in, don't we? Anders can sense them. And it's not like we aren't used to unnatural things hunting our hides." With the scent of violets wreathed around her, she looked down to the path and then jerked her head to Fenris, asking him to lead them on. 

She had to ask him, but she'd do it privately. The rest of the group stepped ahead into the small square before the outer city gate and she pressed him back into a little cut between a stone house and the citywall, a quizzical look on his face until she spoke, "Would you...Sebastian...Maybe you…" _Maker, he’s going to be angry._

He caught her hand. "Come out with it."

Sighing, she spoke again, quietly. "I want you to go back to the boat." Her jaw was clenched as she studied her boots.

 

She wasn't really? He scanned her pale, beloved features and Maker, she was. "Where you go, I go, _leannan_." Aeryn winced at the black tenor of his voice and at the burr that picked up when he continued. "Dinna ask me to let you go on wi' out me. I'm no' a child to be protected from the dark." 

She looked up at him and he caught a trace of fear in her silver-gray eyes. "I know that. I just..." She chewed her lip and he rubbed his thumb along it to stop her. "It's just you've never fought darkspawn and..." 

It occurred to him to ask, "Was that on purpose, that you never asked me to come with you when you knew you'd be running into that sort of a fight?" She cut her glance away and shock ran through him. It was true. "Aeryn, d'you think me incapable of...?" Closing his own eyes, he broke off, couldn't keep the wounded pride out of his voice. 

Oh, Void. Stupid girl, of course that's what he'll think. "No! No. Sebastian, I've never seen an archer to match you. I have no doubt of your skill. But I lost …I lost Carver. I couldn't..." She reached up as if to brush the hurt off of his face, with her rough little fingers. "It's not a logical fear, beloved of my heart. I'm sorry. I have _no_ doubt of you." She repeated her avowal firmly. "I had to ask, for me." 

Taking a breath, he set his hands to her shoulders, gripping and she gazed up into his hooded, fierce eyes. "I would do almost anything to save you grief, _mo chride_ , but do not _ever_ ask me again to stand down from trouble you're walking into because you're trying to protect me. I'm many things, Aeryn. But I'm still a _man_. D'you hear me?" 

Softly, her gaze steady on his, she answered. "I hear you, Sebastian." He pressed a hard kiss against her lips and she succumbed to his entreaty for just a moment before patting his chest and pulling away. "I am sorry." 

"Alright." He followed her out of the cut and she could feel the lingering tension in him, practically prowling at her heels. She sighed. Yes. She'd have some making up to do there.

They caught up the rest of the band just a few feet from the gate. Fenris was scowling at Anders again and Aeryn narrowed her eyes. The mage had a look about him, self-satisfied, like he'd turned his embittered sharp tongue on her partner and struck a vein. They were quiet and she let it go for the moment. Have to keep an ear open, though. 

She gathered them up again and they were walking through the archway when a woman's squeal rang through the air. "Thief! Help!" A tallish, scrawny figure ran past, a wagon between him and Sebastian. He saw Aeryn flip a knife up, but a _clunk, thwip_ echoed next to him and glancing down he saw Varric patting Bianca fondly. 

"There's my girl. Been a while, hunh, sweetheart?" The thief was duly pinned to the stone wall through the scruff of his jerkin, the quarrel having lifted him up off of his feet so that he couldn't get purchase to brace enough to free himself. It was nice work. 

A harried guard ran up. "Blighted nerve. The city's and my thanks, Ser dwarf." He shook his head as he bound the young man's hands in leather and chain cuffs and jerked out the quarrel to lead him off. "Stupid. Picking pockets in front of the Maker and everyone. Find another career, lad, when the Arlessa spares you." He handed the bolt back to Varric with a salute. 

Aeryn grinned at Varric, who chuckled. "For old times, Hawke?" Sebastian raised an eyebrow in query. "That's how I met your lady, Choir Boy. I nabbed an idiot who picked her pocket. I remembered him as a scamp underfoot. Didn't want him turned into target practice for her, just then." Varric acknowledged, winking at her. "You weren't quite as magnanimous as you are these days." 

"You saved his life, it's true." Aeryn's smile turned just a little feral as they walked down the well-traveled lane that would take them to Vigil's Keep. “I admit, I always wondered if you’d set him up in order to ingratiate yourself.”

“Would I have done that, Hawke?” He did his level best to sound innocent. 

“Yes, you would, rascal.” 

Sebastian contemplated…all right, he admitted to brooding as they walked, the easy lope of past journeys returning to them all before they left sight of Amaranthine’s walls. He watched Aeryn, scouting out ahead of them. He often took rear guard on these longer hikes and he was glad of it just now. She had never previously questioned his ability to hold his weight in a fight. And she had not contested his taking of his normal position, clearly in an attempt to show him she didn’t doubt him. Merrill and Bethany were just before him, Fenris to one hand a little further ahead and Varric to the other on either side of Anders. 

It wouldn’t have been so in earlier days. 

Once Fenris would have kept just to one side of Aeryn and Anders to the other and she’d have refereed their bickering and joshed them into better natures. He’d have taken his position, and enjoyed the view of her neat, curvy backside with only a slight qualm about temptation. It had been, to his shame, a fine recompense and a solace in days when he had no right to her closer company. 

She was worried and he had to at least be thankful that she shared that with him. She could have just tried to order him back to the boat, in pretense of helping Isabela and cut up sharp when he argued. She could have hidden it and then tried to shield him in battle. No. She had asked. She had given him some explanation and she had apologized. Carver’s death at the hand of an ogre would be haunting her. 

He understood it, the need she had to keep him away from danger. Maker, if anyone understood, it was him. But just as she would never allow him to do it to her, so too, he would not be kept in an ivory tower. If she fought, so would he.

They walked for two hours. Varric hummed for a while, then broke out into his smooth singing voice, an Antivan romance. Sebastian listened, but Aeryn never added her own sweet voice. He had yet to hear her sing in public, beyond a rowdy pub song. He'd chanced upon her singing soft and low only once and he admitted to wanting to hear her again, but had refrained from asking. Leandra had told him once that Aeryn sang often as a child but had sung only when asked to thereafter. Guilty of pride, yet again, he supposed that he simply wanted her to be happy enough with him that she sang of her own free will. When Varric paused, Bethany started a story of her family's travels through Ferelden. She asked twice for Aeryn's clearer memory as the eldest.

 

Aeryn ignored Bethany the first time, listening instead to something that turned out to be a stream rippling just on the other side of the pines that lined the stretch of Imperium highway they walked. Merrill slipped down the bank and returned with her small, collapsible leather bucket full of cress. 

 

The second time, asked about a picnic spot the family had chanced upon, she glanced back at her sister and then, "I'm sorry, Beth. I don't recall."

 

"Oh, but Aeryn, you have to. Remember, it was so beautiful with the waterfall and the little granite rocks. There was one that had quartz inside when we broke it and Carver wanted to..." 

 

But Aeryn shook her head. "I remember stopping for the picnic, sister. I just..." She glanced around as if she were looking for a distraction and Sebastian caught his breath. He recognized that barely perceptible, desperate look from past conversations. "Father and I went for a walk, right, while Mother set out lunch?" Bethany nodded. "There were ruins. We chanced upon some corpses, graverobbers, and they'd woken up something nasty...hunger demons of some sort. I took a pretty good smack across the head and I don't remember anything after that." 

 

Her sister sounded appalled, shaking her head in denial. "But...you told Mother you slipped. Aeryn, you weren't thirteen yet. Father wouldn't have taken you into a fight like that, then."

 

He saw her shrug. "Chance encounter. C'mon, let's try and make a bit farther before we stop to eat." Aeryn flashed a blithe smile back at the rest of them. "We'll make a picnic of our own, hmm?"

 

Sebastian had to swallow the hard lump in his throat. A bash to the head and her father hadn't been a strong healer. Capable enough, but without Ander's gift for the art. So, she'd healed but lost the whole beautiful day of her memory. Fenris and Varric had their eyes on her as well, on the sudden shift of her shoulders, so he wasn’t wrong to be concerned. Bethany looked pensive. He spent a moment wondering how much she'd realized about how long Aeryn had been training. 

 

So it was not particularly unusual that no one noticed when Anders lifted his head and looked south for a minute as if listening and then hunched back in on himself.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Warning for game level violence._
> 
>  
> 
> _Bioware owns all, I'm just grateful to play in the sandbox._

Aeryn scanned the road ahead of her, looking for a likely spot to rest and eat. They'd made fair time. It was all together possible that they could make Vigil's Keep, tonight. Good. Better stout stone between them and trouble. She'd regret the loss of a chance to make a name for themselves, to be of aid to Ferelden in balance of the trouble that might come if they stayed. But she'd rather not meet darkspawn, given the choice.

The scent of violets wafted to her as she loped, but she pushed away the sweetness of Sebastian’s gift. No sense in being distracted on the road.

They were quiet behind her, the conversation lagging since she'd had to admit to Bethany that she hadn't recalled the long ago picnic her sister had brought up. She'd felt their eyes upon her, making her twitchy and uncomfortable over nothing. It had been a fight, they'd all had concussions now and again. So, she’d been a bit young for it. So what? She mostly remembered the embarrassment that she'd allowed the ragged demon to get to her. It had been a good learning experience, just as Father had promised. She'd gotten faster, better at protecting her back.

There was a clearing up ahead, a low rise to the side of the road with a few trees and grassy.

Something was itching at the base of her spine though. Some nag of instinct. So she kept going.

Aeryn passed the third place that would have made a good rest and Varric was looking at Sebastian with fairly imploring eyes. It was a somewhat disturbing look between one man and another, really, but he got the gist and nodded. Clearing his throat, Sebastian lengthened his stride and stepped up closer to the front. Aeryn didn’t look up at him, her focus on the vegetation along the highway and the small signs that would tell her if anyone had passed recently. 

"Aeryn, were we not going to stop for a bite?"

"Oh, I just thought we'd get on a bit farther." The low voice was light and casual.

" _Leannan_ , we've been three weeks on a ship and we've been walking a few hours. We could use a breather."

Oh. She glanced back and they did look a little weary. There was a burn in her thighs and an ache starting in her back, as well. There was that little nag, though. Paranoia, brought on by their location or something more sinister? She glanced back at Anders, who looked miserable. Well, that was understandable, anyway.

Sebastian was watching her with concern etched between his eyebrows. "Fine. Um. There's a nice spot." She indicated a meadow with a few flat boulders and birch grove. "Better than the last." The last two places had been much the same to Sebastian's eyes, but, fine.

They settled in to their bread and dried spiced sausage supplemented by the cress Merrill had picked and some golden apples that Aeryn had spied in the market and bought just to make Fenris smile. He was particularly fond of apples, she knew. There was a deep satisfied look in his eyes as he took a bite of the spicy, tart fruit. She was crunching her own apple, leaning against Sebastian's shoulder, watching his lovely hands work while he adjusted the nock of his grandfather's bow, when Bethany spoke, hesitantly.

"Sister...about the picnic. You don't mean to say that Father...he didn't let you fight the demons? Not on purpose?"

Aeryn tilted her head, a slight regretful smile on her lips. "No. Of course not, Beth. It was just a thing that happened. You know how that area south of Redcliffe was, there were ruins everywhere. We should have been more careful." She gazed, level and soft, into her sister's eyes. Not quite amber, like Father's had been, just sweetly brown like dark cane sugar. Bethany nodded, reassured, and went back to her snack. Something made Aeryn turn her head back to Sebastian, though, and his brows were drawn, though he kept his attention on his fingers. He opened his mouth to say something, but when she shook her head once, he bit it back and dropped his chin. He cut his eyes to her, though, the gleam beneath his long lashes letting her know that he would not forget the subject.

Surreptitiously, she observed her other companions. Varric had closed his eyes, resting in a sunbeam. Merrill was up and looking for something in the grass. Anders. He had scarfed his food down as always and after a moment, she slid him over another torn wedge of the yeasty bread and a link of sausage. The mage didn't look at her, but he took the extra ration eagerly enough. There was a tensed line in his shoulders, in the curve of his neck. It could likely be explained by their destination.

She took a deep breath of the crisp air, scented slightly with the fir from Sebastian’s soap and his light sweat. She'd closed her eyes against the sun, pressed her shoulders against Sebastian's broad back, for a moment, just taking another breath when the wind shifted. Every nerve she had recognized the smell. _Blight_. 

Sebastian felt her go rigid against him and was about to ask when she sprang from her relaxation like she'd been launched from a catapult. "Aeryn?"

"Hawke?" Fenris was on his feet and reaching for his weapon at her movement, but then they all smelled it, heard it.

The taint in the air, rotting and corrupt. And the sinister huff of bitter laughter.

"How many?" She was staring at Anders, long body folded in on itself, his arms wrapped around his knees. "Anders, how _many_? How close?"

He looked up at her with hollow eyes. "Enough." And then the clearing filled with darkspawn and a handful of rogues popped up in their midst.

The companions scrambled as arrows rained across their rest stop. Aeryn dropped a smoke bomb to cover for Sebastian as he restrung his bow and then jumped up onto a boulder, hoping for a decent vantage point. Aeryn felt a rush of horror at the sun gleaming off his armor, but it wasn't to be helped. Maker, he looked like a leader. Like a target. Void. She shoved the fear away to drive a blade through the hide of a genlock and drew up some of the smoke to hide in, looking for another.

Varric was behind a rock, smacking one of the rogues across the face with Bianca. Bethany had flung a large grouping around with one of her Circle force spells.

Merrill was caught across the field from them and Aeryn lost her for a minute in the smoke from flaming arrows. But she saw vines snaking across the field and had to hope that the elf was holding her own. Fenris had a bead on a tall hurlock, helmeted like a leader.

She felt a gathering spell and threw herself to the side. A lancing shock ran through her and she shook her head at the buzz in her ears from the lightning that had struck an inch or so away. And then she was in the center of a grouping of fighters. It was different fighting darkspawn. She couldn't just let the battle take her, she had to keep her mind clear enough to avoid injury, completely. A flight of crimson-fletched arrows dropped the three genlocks in back of her and gave her room to maneuver. So, Sebastian was still fine. She finished up the set and spun looking through a fire spell for the next fight.

Just behind her she heard a growled, "Shit." Varric...there was a gash across his forehead, bleeding into his eyes. Where was...There. Anders had taken advantage of their distraction and was slinking off to the side. He was running. Bastard. She flung a knife across the field. It struck him, hilt first in the head and she heard the "oof" and the drop of his body falling even as she turned to Varric. 

She covered him to give the dwarf time to patch up. 

"Thanks." He slapped a thin cloth from her pouch across the wound, staunching the blood and smeared salve on top of it, hopefully protecting himself from contamination.

"It was a rock, Hawke. I'm okay." She nodded and set off again towards Bethany. Her sister had backed herself against a boulder and was holding her own until a swarm of life-sapping tainted beetles surrounded her. She flung them off once with a force spell, but she wouldn't be able...where was the mage? Aeryn scanned the field. There against the trees. She dropped into shadow.

Up behind it, down and across its stinking throat. Dead, and the swarm dispersed. She got a glimpse of Sebastian, focused and aiming, settling that part of her mind. She smacked force bombs into the next crowd using their momentary paralysis to dispatch them.

And then the ground shook.

Ogre.

Sod. No. Two Ogres. Holy Maker, where were the blighted things coming from? One was headed for Merrill, still separated from them, though Fenris had worked his way towards her, carving his way through a wall of hurlocks. Aeryn went to assist, shouting, "Bethany...paralyze that sodding thing!" She heard her sister's chant as she cast the spell. It would hold it for a minute, while Aeryn got around.

"Hawke!" Fenris...where?

Twisting and struggling. he looked like he was caught in some spell. His tattoos were glowing and, Maker, he looked terrified. "Hawke...I can't....Anders is..." Anders? But...

Aeryn spun on her heel, searching. He was still down, but somehow he was attempting to draw on the lyrium in Fenris' markings. Flames. The next knife she sent into him was coated in the paralytic cocktail that the poison dealer Martin had tracked down for her. Let the damn spawn have him, then. Eat him alive for all she sodding cared.

"Fenris, are you..." Crouched on the ground, the elf was nodding. Ashen and shaking but in control of himself.

"Go, take care of..."

"Holy Maker..." She spun again at the sound of Sebastian's desperate prayer. Just in time to see the ogre looming behind him.

 _Oh, Maker. No. Please_. Aeryn took off towards him. Images of her brother flashed across her vision, his limp form being cast aside and fear clawed at her. Too cocky. Too arrogant. 

Arrogant as he could be, though, Sebastian wasn't Carver. 

Wasn't young and confrontational, neither bulky nor slow. He leapt backwards off the rock and twisted and fired. Too lithe and fast even for the unnatural speed of the blighted creature. The ogre got in one glancing blow but Sebastian moved with the momentum and rolled up. He shot to his feet to see Aeryn dig her poisoned, ice-runed daggers into its chest and smash a smaller blade through a squinting eye. She flipped to the ground and Sebastian sent an exploding arrow into the other eye.

They were already moving when the thing's head was dispatched. Bethany, Varric and Merrill had the other ogre trapped and Varric made a similar shot with one bolt.

Then the field fell quiet.

And the only thought in her head was death.

Sebastian saw Aeryn streak towards Anders and went after her, shaken to his soul at the fury on her face.

"Bastard. Traitorous, tainted, demon-souled bastard!" She smashed her foot into his side, rolling him over. He couldn't even blink. Her dark little heart was whispering.. _.blade through the shoulder joints. Break his fingers. Strip the skin from his bones. Small cuts to his gut, let him choke on his own festering bowels. Make him pay. Make him beg._

She wanted to. She could see herself doing it. Her fingers tightened around the hilts of her steel and she stepped forward.

She could crash her boot into his ribs again and then drop, straddling his chest and setting her blade to his throat, use the other to draw a bloody line across his forehead. Fear would contract his pupils into tiny points and she would smile to see it. "See, now. Got me where you always wanted me, Anders. You always thought you could handle me, hmm?" She could lean down and whisper in his ear, intimately. "You are going to die. It's going to be slow. And I'm going to _enjoy every flaming minute_ of it."

She could nearly feel the hot splash of blood on her face, the sweet wicked tang of it on her lips. The way his agony would wipe her own fear out of her heart, for a moment.

There was only resignation in his dulled hazel eyes, Justice or Vengeance accepting his fate. He thought she would only kill him. She knew better.

But what would she be after that? 

Sebastian was right behind her. What would he see? 

"Aeryn." She turned to him and though her eyes were dark with the roiling blackness she kept locked away and her small hands bloody, she looked...lighter, to him, somehow. She wiped her blades off on her trousers and sheathed them.

"Are you all right? You did brilliantly. Keepaway was perfect strategy for an ogre."

Her hands pressed against him, checking him over for injury and he indulged her as he used the moment to check her over, as well. "I'm whole, Aeryn. Dinna worry so. We're all right, mo chride. All of us." Her restraint had surprised him and he sent a quiet thought of thanks to Andraste that the madness he had seen hovering around Aeryn like a black broken bird seemed to have flown on.

"You don't know that. We won't know that for hours. Maybe days. And he dared to try and use Fenris..."

"Fenris is well. We're all well, not hardly a mark on any of us."

He wanted to touch her, console her, and then he realized her face was covered in the tainted gore. Choking a little, he went for his waterskin, pulling out a rag from his quiver. He dampened it slightly and wiped her face, careful to keep the dirty water from dripping. 

She glanced down at the bedraggled remains of the violets, stems and shredded petals. "Oh." There was one flower, white with faint purple veining, left whole and she took it and tucked it into her pouch, a sad little frown etching a line between her eyes.

He squeezed her fingers. "It's all right, Aeryn. There'll be others, I promise."

 

The others had gathered in, even as they were rinsing their hands from their own waterskins. 

Her eyes sought out Fenris, his color more normal and standing straight, and he raised a hand to reassure her. "I am, Hawke. Well enough." She nodded and looked for Varric who held his hand up and squeezed her fingers when she set hers in his solid grip. 

"It was just a plain rock, Hawke. Bianca and I are good." 

Bethany and Merrill were pale with exhaustion from the draining use of their mana. "You two need to eat again," Aeryn murmured. "Do you have..." She looked in her pouch. "Here, restorative. Elegant's special blend." She handed them the slender flasks and watched them drink and regain themselves. 

Aeryn felt the adrenaline bleeding out of her leaving bleak weariness in its wake. She’d wanted a fight, craved it even. But betrayal had made it bitter. They couldn't stop here, now. They'd have to build a litter to drag Anders along on. No chance of making the Vigil tonight, either. It would be full dark in less than two marks. Old training reminded her, though. 

"Merrill, do you have enough back for a fire spell?" The elf took a breath, nodded, and started to set the corpses alight. No sense leaving tainted carrion for scavengers to be infected by, though the lingering scent of blood could still call them, or worse, other darkspawn. "We should shift, not stand where the smoke can get us." 

A slight tingle of magic swept over them. Aeryn glanced up at Bethany who shrugged. "Cleansing spell. Anders...ah, _he_ taught it to me, said it was best after a fight with these awful things. Takes care of minor injuries, too." 

They were looking for branches for a litter when a voice called out. 

"Commander...over here!" 

A lean, dark-haired man was standing on the hill over-looking the meadow. The sun, sinking faster to the horizon, was behind him and shadow blurred his features, but Aeryn could swear she'd heard the voice before. 

Another tall, slender figure joined him, then a dwarf and a swordsman. The slender figure raised a hand and hailed them. "Hallo! May we approach?" A woman, with a light Orlesian accent, in blue and silver skirted armor. 

Commander...Sebastian whispered, "Aeryn, this is likely the Warden Commander." 

Aeryn touched his arm and nodded, calling back. "Come on, then. Mind your step." 

"They cleaned 'em out. No fight for us, then," the dwarf grumbled. 

The...mage? Yes, though Aeryn could see a scabbard over her shoulder and her armor seemed heavier than anything she'd seen worn by a mage before. A battlemage, Anders had called her. She stepped lightly around corpses as she walked, trailed by her companions. Aeryn glanced her over as she approached. Long, pale blonde hair and deep-set, dark eyes. Long nose, square chinned, and a golden tone to her skin. 

"Well now, you seem a formidable force. I am Meridan Caron, Commander of the Grey in Ferelden." She was much as Anders had described her; lovely, though leaning close to middle age now, seven years since he'd last seen her. Lines showed around her eyes and mouth, sun and smile marks. 

"Aeryn Hawke." She bowed slightly. The Commander was also Arlessa here in Amaranthine's boundaries and Aeryn rather liked that the woman hadn't tossed it out among her titles. "We ran into a spot of your sort of trouble." The first man, an archer, lifted his head at that but stayed quiet as the other two began assessing the field. 

"Our sort, indeed. Are any of you injured?" The dark eyes scanned them, making note of the patch on Varric's forehead. 

"Not so you'd notice." She saw the moment the mage caught sight of the prone form but before she could speak, the archer spoke gruffly as he bowed. 

"Excuse me, Commander. Lady Hawke, I had hoped to meet you, again." 

Aeryn smiled, recalling him now that she saw him close-up, and greeted him warmly. "Nathaniel Howe! You made it home, then. I'm glad to see it. And how fares your sister?" She felt Sebastian stir next to her and glanced up at him. He was openly assessing the other archer; equipment, armor, the strong features. She refrained from patting him soothingly. She had _met_ other archers, he might as well get used to it. 

Howe tipped his head, the dark hair swinging loose around his face. "She is well, Hawke, thank you. Commander, this is Lady Aeryn Hawke and her companions who came to my aid in the Deep Roads, north of Kirkwall. If you are here, my lady, is Anders here as well?" Aeryn didn't miss the eager start in Meridan's posture. 

"Yes, well. That would be _why_ we're here." 

The mage had stepped towards Anders and glanced back at Aeryn, suspicion edging on her face. "I thought you said no one was injured." Aeryn could hear the trace of steel beneath the cool, cultured tones. The other wardens snapped to alert and Fenris set his hand to his sword behind her as Sebastian went very still at her side. 

Sebastian noted that Aeryn, alone, kept her posture loose and did her best to project weary betrayal. It wasn't her most difficult mask just at the moment, he imagined. And too, the relaxed stance was a lie, as she could spin into lethal motion before a thought had time to form. He balanced the arrow he’d pulled from his quiver, but Maker, please not this. Not over Anders. 

Aeryn felt Caron's dark eyes studying her. "He's not injured. He's been dosed to keep him quiet and if you'll allow it, he should stay that way. We were ambushed because he chose not to..." Aeryn bit off her sharp words, but Meridan's eyes widened at the implication. Sighing, she continued, "Commander, this is a long tale. Is it possible for us to have it elsewhere?" 

"So long as it is told along the way. Geordie, Oghren, do you mind, please?" She tipped her wheaten head towards Anders and Sebastian felt a lingering tension leave Aeryn. As if by that move, she had transferred her responsibility to other shoulders. He edged closer to her and saw the mage's gaze light between them. 

The two wardens made up a travois and at that point the dwarf, Oghren, noticed Anders was awake. "Commander...Sparklefingers is wide eyed and....yeah, not so bushytailed." 

Her head snapped around to Aeryn. "Can he hear us?" 

"He's conscious. Just paralyzed." At that, Howe seemed to perk up and stepped closer as the other two rolled Anders reasonably gently onto the litter. 

"How was this done...spell work or..." 

Aeryn recognized his professional interest and smirked. "Poison. Shuts off the voluntary muscle control. Mixed with magebane, so you know." 

"And where did you find that wicked cocktail?" There was a bright spark in his cool blue eyes now and Sebastian felt a little riled at the new admiring interest in the man’s voice. She had mentioned Nathaniel Howe and he recalled the name from former days. They had been of an age, but he had gone to the Chantry before Howe came to the Marches. 

Aeryn cocked her head and shrugged. "An acquaintance of mine remembered stories from the war, thought it might come in handy and sniffed it out for me." 

"Can I...?" 

"Nathaniel." The Commander bit out the word and the rogue subsided, nodding apologetically. 

"Anders, old friend. How did you find yourself in this predicament?" 

Sebastian stayed still as the mage spoke in Orlesian. He knew Aeryn had some knowledge of the language, as did Varric. But as neither of them made a comment, he too refrained from indicating his awareness. He felt more than saw Aeryn's eyes track Caron's long slender hands as she brushed over Anders body. 

"He's got a knock on his head. Knife to the thigh. Probably some bruised ribs." Aeryn might have been reciting a grocery list. 

A wave of healing magic issued from the mage, and the bruise blooming on Anders forehead faded. She touched his face lightly, finishing her perusal before issuing a stiff and formal invitation. "If your companions will follow, we will make for the pass. It will be after dark, but we can make the Vigil in an hour or two across country. I imagine we will not draw predators as we are such a large number." 

They gathered up their packs and made to follow, eager to leave the battlefield behind. As they topped the hill, fading sunlight caught Fenris's tattoos and the mage's eyes rounded comically. "Is that lyr...." Her hands spread out as if to touch or... 

Blades sang from their scabbards and there was nothing relaxed about Aeryn now, as her shadows flickered. Sebastian was bemused to find himself with an arrow nocked. A shimmering wall of protective magic was set around them, Bethany was as fierce as he'd seen her yet, and Merrill drew power around her beside Varric who had Bianca cocked for the first time since the others had arrived on scene. The wardens saw the grim set of their faces and something of the last years of Kirkwall, danger on every hand, must have shown in their sudden readiness. If the decimated darkspawn hadn't told them of the group's abilities, this show of protection would have. 

"Please refrain from pursuing your...interest...in my companion." Ice formed on every word, not just a hint of steel but a promise in her grey eyes. A second threat to Fenris’ self was too much and the hold Aeryn had on her temper too fragile. 

It was surprisingly, Fenris himself who diffused the situation. "Hawke." His rough voice was fondly amused, to those who knew how to hear it. "You, yourself were curious the first time you saw me." 

"I'm not a mage." Aeryn growled the last word, her eyes locked on Caron who seemed a little disconcerted with the attention. 

"It is fine, Hawke. _I_ am fine. Let us go and be rid of our burden." 

Caron held her hands up in a conciliatory gesture and spoke quietly as one might to a sentient predator. "Lady Hawke, I meant no disrespect to your companion. _Vraiment_...ah, in truth." She was watching Aeryn with a new wariness. She'd been fooled then, by Aeryn's small stature, sweet face, and lazy pose. Not the first. 

Varric sighed a little and Sebastian chanced to glance behind him. The dwarf had that distant gleam he occasionally took when he was composing far-fetched epics for his adventure stories. The Champion who leveled the Gallows meets the Warden-Commander who fought the speaking Darkspawn would sell a copy or two, he had to admit. 

After another moment, Aeryn spun back her blades and jerked her chin. "Lead on, then, Warden." Her voice promised retribution should her trust be betrayed, and Sebastian set a calming palm to her nape once he'd lowered his bow. Tension vibrated below her skin as he rubbed the knobs of her upper spine through the thin leather of her jerkin. She allowed the caress for a moment and then shifted away. Not safe, yet. 

He swallowed a sigh of his own. Meeting a whole troupe of Grey Wardens and he'd like as not be moving on before he could subtly ask questions or hear a tale. His boyhood self would be appalled. _No griffons for him, tonight_ , he thought, mockingly. Maker, such childishness he could still find in his heart. 

The group marched in silence, following the young swordsman, Geordie, as he scouted. The sun dropped lower in the sky, pooling ruddy light behind the trees on the horizon. There was a trail of sorts, once they got beyond the birch grove. The Wardens clearly used this shortcut often to shave time off of their journeys to Amaranthine. On the edges of the woods, animals stirred in the growing dusk, but nothing troubled the walkers. 

Caron remarked softly. "I believe you told me you would tell us of why you have brought our erstwhile comrade back to us, Lady Hawke?" 

"Just Hawke. Varric?" Aeryn wanted to let her raconteur tell the tale; she herself wasn't feeling particularly loquacious. 

"Hmm? Oh, sure, Hawke." He paused a moment. "Well, you'll have heard of the Kirkwall Chantry, Commander?"

"I heard of the wanton destruction and the terrible murders of the Maker's faithful. The story of how it happened is... confusing. The only consistency is about a mage and a..." Caron looked back at Anders' conveyance. "A demon."

"Blondie said he left while you were on a mission, somewhere."

"Blondie? Oh...that is a very strange nickname, Messere Varric. Anyway, yes. I was away when he chose to leave. We believed him dead until Nathaniel discovered him in Kirkwall. We, _I_ grieved." 

"Did you know Justice, Commander?" 

She stopped and turned to him. "I did. He was a friend, of a sort." 

"Did you know Justice and Anders, um. Merged?" 

"Merged? What is...you mean, he left Kristoff and..." Caron began walking again, swiftly, her fishmail skirt shushing in the tall grass. "This was a foolish thing to do. Kristoff was dead when Justice took him. And no mage. Justice was a creature of the Fade...Anders, what did you do?" A faint tone of horror entered her accented voice and her expressive hands flew into the air. "That would make you an abomination!" 

Aeryn held her tongue. Anders had told her once, what happened to the templar-trained Wardens who had tried to stop him when he tried to leave for Kirkwall. She imagined Caron knew about the deaths of her Templars, but not, perhaps, that Anders via Justice was responsible. She might share that tale with Caron, see that she understood the full extent of Anders' capabilities, but not in front of everyone. 

"When we met him, Blondie was the favorite of Darktown, healing, making good on his attempts to make things right. We only saw the...problem when Anders lost his temper. Over Templars or mistreated mages. It got worse, though."

Oghren snorted. "Ain’t that the way it usually goes?"

Varric smirked, then paused. He hadn't yet written this story, didn't have the arc straight in his head. He still couldn't decide if Blondie was the villain of the piece or just another damned victim. "Hawke..." He shook his head in the gloom. He didn't want to tell the story like this, spare and fast. It didn't do the tragedy justice. 

Aeryn gritted her teeth and spoke, "He went mad, Commander. And it happened so gradually we didn't notice. He told us he had a cure, that he could separate himself from Vengeance, Justice that was. So we helped him gather up the ingredients. And then he built an explosive, planted it in the Chantry and murdered Grand Cleric Elthina, her clergy, and her flock." Keeping her voice colorless and even as if it had nothing to do with her at all. 

Caron was silent for a moment. Then sounding ill, she asked, "You know this for fact, that he did it?" 

"We were there. He admitted it," Sebastian answered, shortly. His grief was evident in the sudden thickness of his brogue and Caron glanced at the face of Andraste on his buckle.

"Why did the Templars not seize him and destroy him?"

Aeryn continued, "Because madness isn't exactly a rare condition in Kirkwall. The Knight Commander decided all mages were guilty, declared a Right of Annulment. My sister was in the Gallows, so...then, Orsino, the First Enchanter, did...Void, I don't know what he did. Blood magic of some sort. He absorbed some of the dead and became some sort of creature and we had to kill him. And then Meredith lost what little mind she had and we killed her, too. There's not much left of a power structure in Kirkwall any more. I meant to have the Templars make Anders Tranquil, but they would have put him to death, then and there. I owed him, he was my friend. So, we brought him here to you and he tried to kill us with darkspawn." 

Her hands flew into the air again, one waving at Anders. "And what do you wish me to do with him? Abomination and murderer and Maker-forsaken creature that he is?" 

"You broke him, you get him back. You made him a Warden, promised him his freedom and then left him alone, surrounded by Templars." Aeryn's voice almost shook before she leashed it back. She didn't know what she felt anymore besides torn between black hate and her own sense of loyalty. "He did what he did to save someone he loved and it drove him insane. This way...maybe he can make some atonement before he dies or Vengeance eats him alive. I don't know. I just know that if he stays with me, I'll kill him. I almost did today." 

"There is blood on your hands already, it seems.” Caron shrugged her slim shoulders. “What would be a little more?"

Sebastian snarled before Aeyrn could answer, startling her. "You would have her kill a man she swore before the Maker to protect? Hang him, make him Tranquil, feed him to your dog. I honestly dinna care anymore, Commander. We have enough of our own troubles, thanks to him. And my lady has done her duty to Thedas, returning a Warden to _his_ duty." 

"Sebastian..."

"No, Aeryn. Blood on your hands. She has no idea, that she could ask you so casually..." He seethed at the thought and Aeryn set her hand against his chestplate, soothing. "We should go." There was darkness in his face and it dawned on her that the Commander had disappointed him, sorely.

Howe made a little grunt of disapproval and Caron spoke, "No. I cannot allow you to continue on in the dark. Despite your skill, you could still fall victim to the taint and you have been walking and fighting, you’re tired. A day or so with us will tell. And if you are unlucky, well, at least I can offer some chance." She pointed to the road curving just below them and the broad stone walls just beyond. "And here is the Vigil, anyway. At least break your journey. I promise, we extend all hospitality to you." 

Aeryn glanced back to Anders, saw his hands start to twitch. “He’ll be stirring soon. Let’s get on our way, if we’re going. We’ll stay the night, Commander. But we will leave in the morning, taint or no.” _Oh, please, please not that…No. Shove it back_. She repressed a shudder.

They rounded the curve and entered the massive gates into the Keep’s courtyard. To the right was another stone wall, sheltering small houses in its shadowed bulk. To the left was a bit of a market square, several tables set up and a small forge. It was empty now, in the dark, but showed all signs of constant use. The forge was banked but heat still rolled off of it, reminding them of the chill they’d been ignoring. Bethany shivered beside Varric and the dwarf stepped closer and patted her hip, fondly. 

Other outbuildings stood, solid and protecting. And over them all loomed The Vigil. Gray ancient stone and new, mingled with the unmistakable skilled marks of dwarven stonecraft. Several people had called out to them, in friendly greeting. The Commander was clearly popular, here among her own, as were the other wardens. Curious eyes followed the newcomers and one or two considered the seemingly injured man on the travois. 

A sturdy blonde in Warden’s armor ran up with a few messages for Caron. She flicked through them. “I shall deal with them later. We have guests for the night, if you do not mind letting Varel know, Terri.” 

“Aye, Commander.” She saluted, turned on her heel to trot up the steps into the Keep proper, covertly glancing over the newcomers. 

Caron looked at Anders and then back at Hawke. “Do you think he needs to be restrained, Hawke? Imprisoned?” It seemed a bitter word on her lips and they all noticed his increased agitation.

“That is up to you, Commander. I have told you his crimes and told you why I spared him. As far as I am concerned…he is yours to deal with from now on.” 

Sebastian watched the two women; both with their own sense of barely restrained power. Aeryn’s cool steady gaze. And saw the moment that the mage conceded to the burden, her neck bowing slightly. 

Sighing, Meridan directed, “Nathaniel, take our guests to Varel and see that they are well situated, yes? I will show Anders his quarters for the nonce.” 

The archer smirked and leaned over the prone mage. “Not so bad, Anders. There’s a window, anyway. And the food’s good.” He tipped his head for the companions to follow him and strode up the broad stair. Fenris glanced at Aeryn and then tagged after, as did the others.

Aeryn stood beside Anders for a moment longer, her face blank. His eyes, hazel and sad looked up at her for just a heartbeat, before flicking away. Shame? Disgust? 

Sebastian took her hand and she looked up at him, at the gentle warm blue of his gaze. “Come away, _a ruin_.” She let him tug her along, to the shelter of the Keep.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Author’s Notes: Still at Vigil’s Keep, in the company of the Wardens. Meridan Caron is my mage Warden from the Awakenings run I played after the death of my Mahariel.  
>  Beta’d brilliantly by **mille libri** , much to my delight, but of course any errors are my own._
> 
> _Bioware owns all, I’m just happy to play in the sandbox._

As it turned out, Sebastian did get a Warden tale or two. 

Grey Wardens took post battle cleanliness seriously at Vigil's Keep. Nathaniel escorted them to a small stone flagged room and they were told to strip off by an older, stoutly bustling woman named Brede, the head housekeeper. Aeryn shrugged and shucked her armor. This was a soldier's bivouac and she'd been a soldier, once. Privacy was a foreign concept to such, Sebastian recalled as her trousers hit the floor and he tried not to let his eyes follow their customary track back up the lithe line of her body. No sense in making this more uncomfortable than it already was. The others were more reluctant and only an unruffled, cool, "C'mon, you lot. We need to clean up," from Aeryn got Bethany to even start to slip out of her robes. 

Aeryn was disinclined to give up her smaller weapons, though. She sullenly gazed, hands on her hips, at Howe. Sebastian had to admit the man did a fine job (better than Sebastian himself managed) of keeping his eyes well above her white shoulders and off her nipples, pert as raspberries in the cool air. "Hawke, I swear, no harm is going to come to you from us. Meridan is not about to keep you here against your will. On my honor. Ah, such as it is." 

In a steely tone, she replied, "I will hold you to that, Warden." She unstrapped the arm sheath and the ones on her ankles and Sebastian got a distinct impression of "better you than me, mate" from Nathaniel's retreating glance. 

The grotty pile of armor and weaponry (even Bianca, after fervent assurances to Varric) was taken by two youngish recruits to be cleaned by Wardens who wouldn't be in danger from further exposure to the taint and then they were directed to a bathing chamber. Five wooden, copper-lined baths were filled with steaming water to which something green and astringent was added. 

The potion made the water slightly oily and Aeryn felt it tingling in her more delicate areas, and from the way Merrill giggled and Bethany squeaked, she wasn't alone in that. Hopefully the overheated water would be an excuse for the blush she felt on her cheeks. Sebastian coughed lightly and she blushed a little harder, applying a rough bristled brush and the brown bar of soap quickly as an older man in mage robes came in to check Varric's head and then inspected their hands and nails for any smaller cuts or abrasions. Aeryn got a grunt of approval for being rinsed and done before the rest of them were properly scrubbing and shot a slightly superior eyebrow at her lazy crew as she scrambled into a robe and started toweling her hair dry. 

There were rough gray robes for each of them and they were shown up a set of stairs to a hall lined with doors. These led off to separate rooms, but Sebastian and Aeryn's at least had a door between them creating a connected suite. Aeryn opened the door between them, immediately and strode through to his room. She flung up the sash to the slitted window and kneeling on the narrow stone sill, pushed open the shutters, sticking her still-damp head out into the quiet, chilly night to check the situation. "Hmph. Well, that's probably a doable jump." He looked over her shoulder at the torch-lit ground, rather too far away for his liking. 

"You might make it through that window, _rùn biodagain_. I'd rather make a run for it through the hall." Sebastian paused, considering before continuing, "Are you really that concerned, then?" It hadn't occurred to him that they might be in some danger from the Wardens, but he supposed bringing a criminal to them and then drawing arms upon the Commander might have some repercussions. Or it could just be her natural cynicism coming to the fore again.

"No. I suppose not. Just...I wish we could camp. I know we can't, in case...but, I would prefer to be away." She rubbed her elbows as if she'd taken a chill and Sebastian hugged her to his chest and turned her towards the large postered bed with its feather mattress and an array of pillows in clean linen. 

"I'd rather take advantage of _that_. You aren't the one who's been sleeping half dangling off the bedframe for the last weeks." 

Smirking up at him, she shook her head. "Tsk. Released from your Chantry cell less than a few months and you're already spoiled." 

He laughed, low in his chest. "Aye and whose fault is that, now, hmm?" Tipping her chin up, he pressed his lips to her forehead, the sharp smell of the potion and the oatmeal soap different from her usual fragrance, almost exotic. He brushed kisses down her cheeks and then nipped her lower lip as she snuggled into him, her hands sliding into his robe and around his narrow waist to play up the groove of his spine. "Ruined altogether, it's true." His hands curled around her rounded backside, fondled and then lifted her against him, flicking his tongue teasingly into her mouth and gliding in to taste her. 

Aeryn went a little breathless, feeling her concerns fall silent. "Oh. Been thinking of this bed a while, have you?" 

"And that wall, and possibly th' vanity." 

"Ambitious rake." Fondness in her tone, she nibbled along the sweep of his collarbone to indicate that she truly had no objection to the direction of his thoughts. "Alright. I suppose a night without having to set a watch would be _ah_ , pleasant for _oh_ , everyone." He hummed his approval of her sensible change of plan. 

There came a rapping on the door. "Sister, are you ready to go and eat? Dinner starts in a few minutes, apparently." 

"Be along presently, Beth. Just give us...me a moment." She went back to tracing his ear with her tongue and he shivered. "This wall, you said?" 

Sebastian shifted her against the cool, well smoothed stone. "Thought it would make a change." The ship cabin's bowed walls were rather splintery. 

Fenris called in through her room. "Hawke?" 

"Maker's Breath. Yes, yes, we're coming." Aeryn smiled up into Sebastian’s eyes, her dimple showing and he nuzzled the sweet spot, making her chuckle. "Later?" 

>>>\----- >

They took meal time seriously at Vigil's Keep, too. The kitchen turned out a vast array of plain, but well-cooked dishes for the twenty Wardens, support staff and the guests, spread upon four trestle tables placed in the great hall, one across the head of the room and the other three parallel. As guests, they were seated at the top table next to two empty chairs, one of which clearly belonged to Meridan, but while they received a number of interested glances any curiosity was patently secondary to the food. Even as the older Wardens joshed the recruits about single-minded devotion to their trenchers, Sebastian couldn't help but notice that none of the more experienced Wardens skimped on their servings, either, although they did manage to be neater about it and took their time to actually taste the cook's wares. 

Oghren started the tale-telling, noticing the companions' surreptitious observations, with a reminisce about how King Alistair and Lyna Mahariel used to fall onto any meal like they hadn't eaten in days. "Those two could eat a sodding goat; hide, hooves and all, half a wagon of potatoes, a wheel of cheese and still look around for dessert like they'd starve to death without a cookie." 

Merrill, perking up at the sound of the Hero’s name, ventured to mention that, actually Mahariel had always had something of a prodigious appetite, becoming a full-fledged hunter so young simply because she was trying to make up her share without having to stop eating. "It's nice to know, you know. That she didn't change too much. After." With that bit of information, Merrill found herself at the center of things, with her knowledge of exactly how it was that the Hero had come to join the Wardens. 

No griffons in those stories, though. 

Aeryn kept quiet through out, picking at the bread and greens she'd placed on her plate. The warm glow she'd carried down from their quarters faded in the midst of strangers. She really didn't mistrust the Grey Wardens, but in the face of so many reminders, it was hard to forget the reason they existed. To ignore how many of them came to Join. There had been rumors at Ostagar about the Warden's cure, though it had never been offered to those first victims of Blight. 

She shot glances up and down the table, watching her companions. Searching their eyes, waiting for that first deadly sign- the glazed, empty stare that she remembered from Wesley, from several of her troop at Ostagar, a dwarven carter in the Deep Roads. That had seemed to come first, for all of them. But there would also come blackening veins; she scanned their skin. Fenris on one side of her, his olive skin gleaming from the residual potion from the bath, the tattoos shining slightly. Sebastian sat to her right and she watched his hands as he cut his meat, dreading the idea that his clean, neatly trimmed square nails, any minute now, could start to turn grey and thick. Her breath grew tight in her chest at the thought and she had to concentrate, to appear to breathe normally, to keep her features still, a politely interested smile on her mouth as panic clawed up her throat. If he could be made a Warden, she would follow. She would _beg_. But, oh, Maker...please. 

Sebastian heard her breath catch, saw Aeryn’s knuckles go white around the knife she held even as her face, the straight line of her back showed no difference at all. Fenris had noticed as well, and caught Sebastian's eye to make sure the archer was paying attention. Fenris nudged her with his knee until her hand relaxed and she nudged her partner back and then Sebastian leaned closer and whispered, "Aeryn. We're all fine. Look, no one has any sign. We're well, _leannan_." She turned towards him, slightly but her eyes were cast down at the table. 

"I know. I know...I just..." Dragging her chair closer, Sebastian felt her leg twine around his as if his love was craving a reassuring touch. Glad to oblige, he curved his hand around her elbow, stroking the soft skin with a callused forefinger. 

"Let the Maker have it, _mo chridh_ e. Dinna borrow trouble." Sebastian ordered firmly, though he tipped up the corners of his lips and his eyes sparkled gently down at her when Aeryn finally looked up with an arched brow at his tone. "You'll feel better if you eat. Here, try this, it's good." He held out a bite of the bacon-wrapped venison, daubed with a ruby jelly, that he'd been sailing into when he noticed her distress. 

She took the small bite from the blunt spine of his table knife. It _was_ good, the tart jelly contrasting with the rich gaminess of the venison. "Cranberries. They grow in bogs, around here." 

The pink tip of a tongue caught a small smear off the corner of her mouth, fastidious as any cat, and Sebastian felt himself stir, again. Stone walls and a proper bed, for at least one night. Thank you, Maker. Something of the warm thought clearly crossed his face, as Aeryn smiled a little, slyly and her foot slid up his calf. He took a hasty sip of his wine. My, it was thirsty work, being her distraction. 

After she pulled away from him, Aeryn took a few bites of her own meal, taking a slice of the meat and another of the pork roasted with apples that Fenris dished up for her, feeling a bit foolish at their coddling. She wasn't a child either, to need distracting and humoring through a silly daydream. When exactly had she become so needy and weak? Popping her neck, Aeryn took a good mouthful of her wine and resisted the urge to wrinkle her nose. She'd never be able to enjoy the stuff the way Fenris and Sebastian did, though Fenris had taken great pains to teach her what made for a quality vintage in the early days of her nobility. She could fake appreciation and this was meant to be nice, fruity and warm-flavored. Ah, well, at least it was alcohol, she thought, taking another swallow. 

The meal progressed through dessert, a homely bread pudding, and a cheese course. As efficiently as they ate, the Wardens cleared tables and broke out cards and dice. One or two had instruments, and there was soon music in the hall. It was, Aeryn supposed, a typical evening among the troop. Merrill and Oghren continued to trade stories about the Hero and a small group gathered around them, rapt, one or two looking at Merrill, flushed and sweet, with an appreciative eye. Bethany was earnestly discussing the bath potion with Dernal, the mage from the bathing chamber. Varric and then Fenris went to join in a hand of Diamondback and Aeryn pushed Sebastian towards them, after she caught him glancing towards the game. 

"You're sure?" There was a trace of worry in his warm voice. 

She sniffed impatiently. "Go. I don't need a nursemaid." 

Something hurt flashed in the bright blue eyes, but Sebastian went without another protest and Aeryn felt a little guilty at her relief from scrutiny. 

Nathaniel joined her a minute later with a pitcher of cider and she gave him a crooked grin. "Never met a Ferelden-born who didn't prefer cider or beer to fancy grape juice. Now, I want to know all about that neural poison."

""Ah, well, if it's bribery you're aimed at..." She launched into the story of Martin, the smuggler and poison dealer she'd aided in earlier days. 

Sebastian watched Aeryn and Howe out of the corner of his eye, waiting for a seat to open at the card table. She wasn't faking her enthusiasm for the topic and Sebastian knew she liked having someone with whom to talk trade secrets. Relying on his aim and accuracy, Sebastian never had much interest in poison as a weapon, so he pushed back the slight hurt that bubbled up at his lover’s dismissal. There had definitely been something wrong, but she seemed well enough now, pulling a few violently colored vials out of her pocket to show to Howe. The other rogue set out a few of his own and they were plainly trading as Aeryn separated out a couple and pushed forward one of his and Howe shook his dark head and rearranged the vials in a different way, two of his for three of hers. 

The fact that Aeryn turned sharp after feeling vulnerable didn't surprise Sebastian, really, it had just been a while since she'd done it. With him, at least. Ah well, they had been living on top of one another for a while. Perhaps a bit of space wasn't a bad thing. A chair scraped to make room to deal him in and Sebastian turned to the game. 

One smart hand led into another, and it was well after a half mark before Sebastian thought to look up to find Aeryn. It took him aback to realize she’d left the Hall without saying anything. Scanning the room, he found Nathaniel talking to a well-dressed older man with grey hair and a worn countenance. Sebastian raised his hand to catch the other archer’s attention and when Nathaniel saw him, called out, “Hawke?” in query. Howe pointed to the table where he’d sat with Aeryn and looked startled to find her vanished. But there it was, she'd gone missing again. Sebastian sighed. He would not go after her again, just yet. Let her have her time to herself.

 

>>>\----- >

 

Nathaniel had gone to ask another rogue about a toadstool infusion they'd been working on when Aeryn felt another stirring of worry. Bethany was still talking to the Dernal, going on about some variation of a force spell Beth had been trying to improve upon. The flickering light of the Hall's open fire had crossed her sister’s face, throwing the fine bones into sharp relief, carving shadows into the hollows of her cheeks and pooling in her eyesockets. It made her look half-dead and Aeryn had to grab the bull-nosed edge of the table, dig her nails into the grain of the wood, to stop herself from leaping up to look her in the eyes. Dernal would have said something if her sister had suddenly been over come right in front of him. Bethany was well, untainted. They all were, otherwise some symptom would have shown itself by now. Get a grip on yourself, Aeryn scolded mentally. 

Still, she'd been sitting rather too long, she really didn't need anything else to drink, and the noise of the gathering was starting to wedge itself behind her eyes in a headache. Glancing around to make sure everyone was well occupied, Aeryn slipped to the edge of the room and ducked into the shadows. With one look back at the firelight glinting off of Sebastian's ruddy hair, his bright eyes intent on his cards, Aeryn went to explore a bit. 

With the majority of the Warden complement in the Hall, Vigil's Keep loomed around her silently. The stone walls and pools of darkness were a relief, solace after the too-bright wall of sound made by a gathering of mostly young, healthy people actively engaged in entertaining themselves. Aeryn padded through the cool shadows, letting her vision adjust and her rattled composure reset. She passed the library filled with the dusty scent of paper and the well-tended leather of bindings and the passageway down to the cellars, a familiar scent of cool dirt and mustiness. 

Halfway up the next level, she felt eyes on her, heard a soft patting foot step just behind her. Hedging into the deeper shadow thrown by the railing, Aeryn turned around.

To find a small marmalade cat observing her, arrogance in every line of its lithe body, curiosity betrayed by the tail curling over pointy ears in a question. "Hullo, moggie. Who belongs to you, hmm?" She knelt down on the stair, balancing on her heels, and held out a hand. Delicately, it sniffed her fingers and deigned to allow her to skritch under its chin. 

The purr filled the stairwell and Aeryn smiled as it came closer and waited for her to sit back and make a lap to curl up into as she shifted her attention to just behind his ear, which had a rakish tear just under the tip. "Oh, friendly, pretty fellow, aren't you? I've a pretty lad who likes to be petted just like that, you know, though he’s a bit bigger. And it’s generally me in his lap, I suppose." The puss gave her a little "chirrup" and kneaded her thigh through her leather trousers. It was a comforting feeling that she had all but forgotten in the intervening years since she’d been a farmgirl. Kirkwall had not been friendly to small animals. Anders had lost more than one attempted pet to someone's stewpot and to the less scrupulous pie makers in Darktown. They sat in the quiet spot, each enjoying the unexpected company for a few minutes.

"Pounce? Pounce _ou est tu, ma p'tit_? Come, there's someone who wishes to see you..." Pounce? Oh...Maker. Ser Pounce-a-lot. _Anders_ ' cat. Aeryn felt a hard tug at her heart. 

She swallowed. "I may have your cat, Commander." 

"Oh!" Caron looked down at her from the landing, tanned features flushing to be caught out cooing for a cat. She'd changed out of her armor into a set of soft dark robes that flowed around her long limbs. "Yes, that would be our Ser Pounce. A most noble member of our company." The mage hesitated and then, "I wish you would call me Meridan, Hawke. I second Nathaniel's oath, I am not your enemy. I am sorry if I offended you earlier or gave you cause for concern. I'm...truly, I am grateful that you chose to return Anders to us." 

Aeryn nodded, looking back at the cat in her lap, its golden-green eyes half-closed in pleasure. "I'm sorry if I seemed...unfriendly. I was rather, ah, unsettled." 

Meridan waved her hands, dismissing the whole afternoon. "Pfft. Running into a Darkspawn horde unaware will do that to a woman, believe me. He...Anders wished me to apologize for him. He is...terribly distressed that he might have brought you to harm, but I think he will understand that you might not wish to allow him his apologies in person." Meridan stepped down to come and sit near her on one of the wide stone steps, folding and tucking her robes to keep the chill of the flagstone well away from her derrière.

"Not the first time I've been ambushed. Not likely to be the last. He knows that as well as anyone. But, no, I won't be seeing him again. Hopefully." Aeryn’s tone was clipped and Pounce shifted in her lap, a comforting weight as he batted at the edge of her sleeve, insisting on more petting. 

"Our healer, Dernal, seems very content that you and your companions will not suffer any lingering effects from your encounter. He says it was unlikely as you were all very careful. You have…met darkspawn, before?"

Aeryn nodded, letting her fingers stroke through the soft orange and white fur at the cat's chest and Pounce curled playfully around her hand. "A time or two in the Marches. And...I was at Ostagar." 

"Oh. Oh, I see. That would be why..." Impatiently pushing back the long pale hair around her face, Meridan cleared her throat. "Anders said he thought you should have a draught, for nightmares." 

Aeryn couldn't help a bitter chuckle. Still trying to fix her, despite it all. And so, too, was she. "Sodding healer. I never take the stuff...never helps. I'm fine." 

Meridan looked at her and Aeryn felt rather pinned by the dark eyes. She resisted the urge to shift under the observation and met the woman's gaze, calmly. "If you are sure, Hawke? I'm sure Dernal would..." Aeryn shook her head and, seeing the taut mouth, Meridan chose to change the subject. "We have another veteran of Ostagar here. My seneschal, Varel, was with King Cailan’s Army." 

Oh. "My brother served with a Captain Varel." Maker, why in flames did I tell her that?

"You should speak with him then. I'm sure he has fine memories of your brother." 

Aeryn snorted, startling the mage. "I doubt it, Carver was a bit of a tit." She scooped up a protesting Pounce and set the cat into the robes spread between Meridan's knees, rolling up to her feet in a graceful move that the older woman admired ruefully. "Here. I should be going. Early morning, hopefully, unless my merry band drinks themselves unsteady." Aeryn backed away, brushing a tuft of orange fur from the velvet waist she'd worn at Sebastian's insistence. He was fond of the laces up the back.

"Might I ask your plans? It is just...Anders mentioned that you might be sailing on to Denerim, that you were planning to meet with King Alistair?" 

Void, had Anders been doing nothing but speaking secrets since she'd left him? 

"That would be the plan for the moment, yes." Best to be vague, Aeryn thought.

Now it was Meridan who was hesitant. "If it is possible, could you carry a message? I could send it, but with winter coming on, the trip is a bit more difficult across country and I would like to keep my Wardens closer to home. I would also like it to reach the king intact." She added the last almost sharply.

Aeryn let her lips twist wryly. "Well, rogue and thief though I am, I can manage to deliver a message untampered with." 

"I did not mean..."

"Yes, you did. It's fine. I'm well used to it." 

But Meridan was waving her long, expressive hands again. " _Non_. No, we have had some troubles with intercepted messages. I do not mistrust my seconds, but...well, anyone can be distracted, yes?"

"It's true." Aeryn took a few steps up the stairs. "I'll collect it first thing. Good night, Commander." 

" _Bon nuit_ , Hawke. Sleep well." If Meridan was startled that Aeryn seemed to disappear within a few steps, she didn't indicate it by a noise. Then again, she was used to silent retreats and touchy rogues.

Aeryn sniffed out the kitchen, down another spiraled staircase, and collected a tea tray from the undercook before returning to her room. A servant had laid a fire and it made a cozy, cheerful glow in the small tower room. She set her snack to the side and reached behind her to unlace the pale blue velvet vest. Sebastian would just have to help her another time, she was feeling too constricted by the cinched waist to wait for him. Shucking out of her boots and trousers, Aeryn folded them aside, leaving the darker blue linen tunic on for the moment. 

Her daggers, knives, scabbards and sheaths had been returned and she crouched down to inspect them. It was, Aeryn had to admit, a fine job. The blades all had the warm glow of well-treated steel, the ivory sheen of fine dragonbone. The leather was clean and supple again and her fingers lingered fondly against it. Tools of her trade, she was never quite as comfortable with them too far from her side. Not that she had gone to dinner unarmed, but these were her favorites, weapons she'd earned in combat, taken by right of arms, rune-marked by Sandal to suit her skill style with ice and paralysis. 

Setting them back down, Aeryn stood, stretching her arms up over her head. Oh, too tight. The tensions of her earlier stress were telling in her shoulders and hips. Need a good run-through, she decided and stripping off the tunic and laying it neatly on the chair, started the exercises that would set her back limber and smooth. 

 

>>>\----- >

Sebastian had finished his game, recalling Aeryn’s nursemaid comment. A half-mark passed before he collected his winnings and checked with Varric and Fenris before he went hunting, to see if they had seen Aeryn leave the Hall. "If Hawke decided she was ready to leave, Sebastian, why do you think she would announce it?" Fenris had asked, somewhat amused. "She probably had a headache. Wine usually doesn't agree with her." Sebastian hadn't known that, though he knew she only drank wine when there was no other choice. 

Nathaniel had been a little put out, having wanted to introduce her to the seneschal, Varel, who had been in a meeting until just before dinner had ended. Sebastian had made her excuses. "I'm sorry. Aeryn is not always the most social of women, if she's tired." Nor would she have been particularly interested in reliving Ostagar, which seemed to be the reason Nathaniel wanted her to meet Varel, but Sebastian decided not to mention that. Aeryn was particular about her personal history and who knew it. 

If Fenris was right and she had a headache, she had either gone outside for the fresh air or back to their quarters. Sebastian checked the courtyard first, but neither of the guards on duty had seen her. Which meant little, he supposed, considering Aeryn and her penchant for the shadows. Passing the Warden Commander, who was talking animatedly in Orlesian to a small orange cat she carried, Sebastian bid her goodnight. 

He went in to his room, but didn't see any sign of Aeryn. The door was closed between their rooms and, ah, there she was. Small huffs of breath she allowed herself when she stretched broke the quiet. Sebastian pushed the door open, quietly, hesitating after the way she'd pushed him away earlier. 

Aeryn was an arc, in a backbend on the large woven rug, facing away from him, skin sheened ivory in gliding firelight. She shifted her weight to her hands and flipped her feet over before twisting her body in a gentle movement to bring herself up, the fire catching sparks like garnets in her dark red hair as it settled. He watched her, the graceful pure line of her body in motion as though she were living sculpture. The fine bones of her face fascinated him; the delicate curve of her jaw relaxed and the usual wry twist of her lush mouth gone soft in a moment of peace and ease. On her feet again, she shifted into the position she told him was called the archer, and sent a sultry smile at him down the elegant length of her arm. 

"Come and join me?" she invited, in her low voice. Keeping his eyes on hers, tip-tilted and smoky, Sebastian unbuckled his jerkin and toed out of his boots, tugging his tunic off, while she held her pose. He draped his clothing neatly on the chair beside hers. Both of them kept long habits of treating their clothing well, Aeryn’s formed in a poor childhood and his in more recent years in the Chantry when he had little by choice. He took a breath and turned his body parallel to hers, raising his arms and bending his forward knee. 

"You know, this would be a terrible way to fire a bow." 

"So you've said." But there was a laugh in her voice and Sebastian knew she didn't take offense. They weren't Aeryn’s names, anyway. She'd picked up one and another stretch in various places. This one from an elvhen scout she met in the army. She shifted her body and Sebastian followed the movement, almost exactly. He'd started stretching with Aeryn more often since they'd left Kirkwall and he admitted to feeling the difference. A loosening and an ease that Sebastian hadn't realized he'd needed, though he'd never be quite as fluid as she was, he thought. Not quite up to wrapping himself into a knot, like a particularly nicely shaped snake, but he was able to make acrobatic moves with less stress. 

They worked in tandem for another quiet quartermark, listening to each other breathe, shutting out the world around them as they worked up a light sweat. Occasionally Aeryn would touch his long foot or the sculpted arm, adjusting his position with a care she knew to be just a little fussy, but a nice excuse to lay hands on him. There had been a reason she never taught Sebastian her routine in Kirkwall, before he’d left the Chantry.

Eventually, Aeryn led him down into a plank position and then sat up, watching the long, muscular form of him, carefully. "Raise up another bit." He arched his back one more inch and she leaned over to press his head lower, gently, her fingers lingering on his sensitive nape in a tender touch. "Don't strain your neck." 

Sebastian held the position under her gaze a minute and then sat up, back on his heels, linking his hands and extending his arms to the ceiling to enjoy the stretch. "Why did we not do this before?" 

Aeryn grinned at him, ruefully. "I rather thought it might be stressful to our working relationship." She slipped behind him and set her small strong hands to work on the rounded muscle of his shoulders and he slumped forward to allow her better access. "I thought, perhaps, you would think I was flirting with you. And to be properly honest, I didn't trust myself." She set her forehead between the solid planes of Sebastian’s shoulder blades, and he felt the soft whisper of her lips against his spine before she purred, "Such a temptation, all this golden skin. The way you are so wondrously made. Exquisite. Oh, Sebastian, I was just trying to protect myself from wanting you so."

"Ah, just after me for my body?"

She snorted. "Oh yes. Had nothing to do with that beautiful voice. Or the way you can turn a joke. Or your sense of honor. Or the deep passion in you, for the things that matter." 

The sweet praise started a warm glow in him, and Sebastian caught his breath at the feather-light contact of her lips against the welted scars he carried, the remnants of his father's brief interest. Her hair, the bangs growing too long again, trailed against the heated slick flesh of his back, hands softened from the firm massage to caresses, the roughness of her fingers starting fires along the slopes of his frame and Sebastian released the breath he'd taken at the touch of her mouth. "I did think, sometimes, that maybe you didn't quite like me. You kept yourself at such a distance."

"Only that I liked you so well, beloved." Aeryn let her hands drift lower, as she assured her lover, enjoying the feel of his skin, the crisp light hair under her palms; running down to his flat stomach and skirting his hips to the tops of his thighs, back around to his high firm arse. "Only that I wanted to save you from my attentions, when I didn't think you wanted them." 

Her round plump breasts were pressed flush against his back, nipples hard against his sensitized skin, even through the breastband she still wore. Unable to keep his hands from her a moment longer, Sebastian scooted to the side and turned, grabbing Aeryn around her slim waist and lifting her into his lap. Running one finger down the sweet curve of her cheek, he watched her eyes go wide at whatever she saw in the depths of his gaze. 

"I have never not wanted your attentions. I will never not want them." Sebastian nudged her lips open, sweeping his tongue into her mouth and she settled against him, with a sigh, her hands carding up into his hair as she sucked him deeper, sliding her own pink tongue against his suggestively. Nimble fingers flicked open the catches of her breastband and released her full, firm flesh to his hands. Sebastian pulled back from her, just a second to see her smoky eyes and caught his breath at the sudden vulnerability he saw there. "What, sweetling? What is it?" 

Aeryn closed her eyes then, pressing away the memory welling up of the afternoon, how close the ogre had been to grabbing him and crushing him. No. He had been faster. Sebastian had been quick and lithe, smooth as the large tawny lions that hunted in the Vimmark Mountains. He was fine. He was here.

"Nothing. You were so perfect this afternoon, Sebastian. I do love to watch you, see you fight." She buried her face in his neck and lapped at the trickle of sweat she found there, in the hollow of his throat, letting one of her hands drag down his chest to his trousers, cupping him and tracing the hard ridge of his cock through the supple doeskin. "I need you. Oh, I do. So much, please." There was a hitch in her voice that made him gather her closer, pressing her skin to his in a promise of comfort. 

"I’m yours. Oh, Maker knows I want you, so, _mo chridhe_." Taking her sweet, lush mouth again, he flexed his hips up to bump his cock against her thigh and she twisted to straddle him. Sebastian shifted his weight, wrapped his arms around her, and rocked, lifting her as stood. "Right now." 

Gasping her approval, Aeryn clung to him, curling her stroking tongue into his heated mouth, still spicy with the taste of whiskey he’d drunk earlier, her hands grasping his shoulders and the breath left her again as Sebastian braced her against the chilled stone wall. One large, work hardened palm slid down her side, setting off sparks under his roughened fingertips until he reached her smalls and yanked apart the tie that held them. Shifting his hold, his right hand stripped them off to the other side urgently and he freed his straining cock from his trousers and set himself against the slippery wetness at her cleft. "Look at me as you take me in, Aeryn."

Her eyes locked on his, on the deep, flaring blue that haunted her dreams and she bit her lip, moaned her need as he hilted himself in a stroke. 

They worked together, each movement chasing the other. Sebastian ran his hands up under her arms and cupped his hands behind her head, cradling the fragile curve of her skull, tangling in the silk of her hair as he laved her throat, the upper swell of her breasts.

Her own hands smoothed down the straining tendons of his neck over the broad sweep of muscle at his back, glorying in his strength, in the slide of his pliant skin under her demanding touch. Slim fingers speared in the tangle of ruddy curls at the nape of his neck, dragging his hard lips to hers with a whimper for a shattering, clashing kiss as he relentlessly thrust, again and again. Pressing her spine back against the wall for leverage, her legs locked tight around him, her heels drumming against his arse as he flexed, as they surged in concert. 

"So tight, so perfect.... _barr maiseach_.” He growled in her ear and Aeryn shivered at the desire in the brogue as though it were another touch on her sensitized skin.

She arched against him, hard, crying out as the tremors took her, as she caught him in the clutching draw of her sheath and dragged him with her into the rushing stream of heat and sensation. 

Sebastian trembled with her for an endless moment, the force of his climax rendering him weak, before he could lift Aeryn away from the wall and carry her to the waiting feather bed. Stripping his trousers off, he crawled in to curl up with her in the lavender scented linens and relaxed, heat pooling between them and chasing away the chill she'd taken from the stone at her back. He curved his palm around the softness of her breast, craving the warm weight of it in his palm, reluctant to relinquish the closeness that they carried from their loving. Aeryn spread her own small, scarred hand over his and Sebastian dropped a kiss on her flushed nape as their breathing slowed. 

"How...how was the card game?" 

He smiled against her fine skin scented with salt and their mutual desire. "Well enough, I earned a bit of pocket money." 

She chuckled and turned in his arms to cuddle. "I think I should feel guilty. You spent your evening playing cards and then came to me for a proper good time. I've led you far down the primrose path, darling man." 

"Oh, aye, I'm debauched altogether these days. But for the fact that it is all for love, I'd never get off my knees in penance. I do love you so, Aeryn." Said with such honest conviction that Aeryn had to sigh at the bubble of warmth that swelled in her throat. She traced the line of his cheekbone as she answered. 

"And I love you. Tell me again, about Starkhaven." 

Sebastian wavered for a bit. They'd started to do this on the ship, a way of teaching her the things she needed to know about his home, even a bit of the tongue...but it reminded him of the afternoon's conversation with Bethany. He hesitated to bring it up now, with her sweetly curved and replete in his arms. But..."Aeryn?" 

The change in his tone sent her spine stiff again and he winced at the wariness in her voice, "What, then?" 

"Do you mean to never tell Bethany the truth? About how you grew up? Does she not deserve to know?" What it is you gave to keep her safe. What your father made of you. 

"Oh." He stroked his hand down her flank, soothing, and she breathed in the warm, dark male scent of him. "I suppose you think I should." She spoke, level and calm, giving him a chance to explain. 

Ah, this will go well. Had her sweet and soft and couldn't just leave the woman alone. Idiot. "I do. She's not a child any longer and, I imagine, she has started to put things together. Better you tell her straight, don't you think?" 

Her hesitant answer startled him, her voice only a whisper across his collarbone. "It's hard to change old habits, Sebastian. I don't want...I don't want her feeling guilty for what she had no control over. And I don't...what if she agrees with you? If it changes the way she thinks about...?" 

Their father. Well and it should and maybe you'd see him more clearly yourself. But he was more diplomatic in his answer. "And isn't it her right to know what it cost, to keep her free?" 

"It didn't cost..." 

"No! Maker, Aeryn. Don't lie there and tell me it cost nothing. I'm the one holding you at night when you scream in your sleep." 

Aeryn shoved against his chest, trying to scramble away from him, but he tightened his arms about her until she went still. "No. Stay with me. I willna say I'm sorry for speaking truth to you. Would you want me ta lie about what I believe?" 

"Let me go." She snarled, something wounded flashing in her eyes beneath the bright anger. 

"I will not. I mean to be the man holding you every night until the day I die. Every night! It is my privilege to love you, to give you what comfort I can. I take the hard with the sweet. But don't expect me to ignore the bitter, _mo chridhe_. And dinna run from it yourself." 

Aeryn twisted suddenly, jabbing him in the ribs, breaking his hold on her and rolled out of the bed to her feet, up on her toes even as he pulled up to his knees. Gray eyes gleamed, metallic in the firelight, all the softness in her gone. "I wasn't going to say it didn't cost anything, Sebastian. I was going to say it didn't cost anything I wasn't willing to pay. My choice. Every time. My own sodding _choice_ , to kill or not. And so it will always be." 

"It's not your life now that I regret the choices of, _leannan_. It's the small lost things of your girlhood that your father stole, that you seem to have no regard for, that break my heart." 

"You've forgiven your father for _beating_ you, for casting you aside. Why can't you see that mine was just teaching me how to protect myself, the ones I love?" 

"Because he _hurt_ you to do it. He marked you, belt or no. I will _not_ forgive that." 

Aeryn spun away and stalked into the other room. Sebastian was up and bracing his hand against the door before she could slam it shut between them, though. "Let go. Leave me be." 

"Close this door tonight, if you must. But, by the Maker, if I hear you slide the bolt, I'm coming _through it_." Sebastian stood away and she slammed the door, shaking wood dust into the air. He smacked his fist against his side in frustration. 

The bolt didn't slide. Small mercies.

He scrubbed his hands over his face and through his hair. They had to talk about these things, had to have them out. But, Holy Andraste, Sebastian thought, looking with regret at the bed, the soft scented linens, he could have perhaps picked a better night to do it. 

Aeryn stared at her side of the door, hand set to throw the latch. What in the Void just happened? Why couldn't he just...let it go? 

Fine. If he couldn't keep from questioning her father's motives, if it was such a _duty_ to sleep with her, Sebastian could bloody well sleep alone. She heard him on the other side as he slid down the door, the light in the crack shutting off abruptly and she backed away to pace across the floor. 

Hmph. Daft man. No reason for him to sleep on the bloody floor. His own fault if he ended up costive, sitting on cold stone. Aeryn resolutely crawled into the empty bed in her...well, his room since these were his packs. If he didn't want to be comfortable, she did. Serve him right for not leaving well enough alone. 

In the other room, Sebastian had started speaking. Aeryn could hear the rhythmic murmur of some verse of the Chant through the wood, his rolling lilt transforming it into music. 

She curled up in the chilly blanket and shut her eyes against the headache that was back with a vengeance, throbbing behind her eyes. But...why did it bother her so? Sebastian wasn't wrong that Beth was due some truth. And _that_ was the crux. If they thought her father was wrong to have trained her, if Bethany agreed with Sebastian...would it make Beth want to go back to a Circle? Think that's where she always should have been? 

And if Sebastian wasn't wrong? And Aeryn was? What did that make her, in the end? 

Still puzzling it over, Aeryn fell asleep with Sebastian’s voice still barely audible, but present. 

_She'd been a lucky child on her eighth name day she had a new dress and a set of green ribbons and a book of tales about the Black Fox and sturdy, grubby four year old Carver handing her a crushed handful of pale violets, half with the roots still attached dirt all over her dress and she laughed and he smiled up at her, snaggle-toothed where he'd knocked out his baby dogtooth trying to play barbarian with a length of seasoned oak for an axe._

_"You could have written, you know..."_  
Not quite eighteen year old Carver had all his teeth, white and straight, striding up to camp one bleak day early in Guardian as if he belonged there, saying he'd joined up. Handing her a letter from mother, she opened it to find another violet in the folded paper, so fresh he must have just found it, a smudgy fingerprint on the white cotton paper.  
"You can just un-join up, brother mine. No place for children and Mother needs you and I did more than my share." 

Sebastian was horribly disoriented when he jerked awake a few hours later. He hadn't been asleep long, having watched the fire dwindle into embers, but apparently he had slept, head leaned against the door, where he'd gone to his knees, praying for clarity and guidance. The Maker had set this sweet, sharp, difficult woman in his path, He could at least listen when Sebastian smashed into a wall with her.

He was trying to figure out what woke him when... 

" _Carver_?" 

Oh, Maker...Aeryn. He pushed himself away from the door, shaking himself awake.

"Where...I can't find you. Carver?!" 

Joints creaking from too long on the floor, he stood. That voice...not like hers at all, high, too sweet. A little girl's voice, calling for her lost brother. 

Pushing the door open he saw she was sitting up in the fading light of banked embers, the covers pushed to the floor, tears silvering her face. "Mama...oh, Papa I'm so, so _sorry_. I lost him, I can't find him....Carver?" 

Sebastian crossed the room and knelt gingerly back down on the floor next to the bed, touched her bare knee with a hesitant hand. If she was dreaming she was a child, he didn't want to scare her with an embrace, "Aeryn...shh, _à ruin_. It's all right." 

The tears stopped and she startled at his voice, but her clouded eyes still had the look of dreams. She wasn't seeing him. "I can't..." A cool hand reached out, barely skimming his cheek. "He's always wandering off...I can't find him." The last almost a wail. 

Catching her hand, Sebastian rubbed warmth back into it. "Hush, hush. He's safe, _mo chridhe_. He's with your mother...and your father. Hush, now." 

"Oh...but...but Beth, my sister...." 

"She's safe in her bed, Aeryn. Dinna worry." Well, he hoped she was, anyway. 

Confusion flooded her delicate features. "Is it me that's lost?" Small sweet little voice, oh, Maker, my heart. 

Sebastian took her other hand, holding tightly and felt her chilled little fingers clutch his. "No, _nigheanad_ , how can you be lost? I've found you."

Aeryn blinked, tears still clinging to her dark lashes as a shudder tore through her. "I...I don't know that one." Ah, the low, soft voice he loved, here she was. And like her, too, to request a lesson even as she shook free of a nightmare.

Sebastian took the chance to sit up on the bed with her. " _Nigheanad_?" When she nodded, he explained. "Little girl. You were dreaming..."

"Of Carver, of course." At his questioning grunt, Aeryn explained, “Always do, after a fight with darkspawn.” She curled up against him, needing his warmth, letting him tuck her safely into his shoulder with a sigh. "I woke you up, for all my intent to be alone." 

"I'll never mind, Aeryn. I swear. I’m..." Sebastian didn't want to lie to her, tell her he was sorry for bringing the subject of her father up. "Every night, for the rest of my life, Aeryn." 

Shaking her tousled head at him, she couldn't help a chuckle. "You're something of a glutton for punishment. You know that, right?" Oh, his poor knees. Her hand soothed over the reddened sore-looking skin. His shins and the front of his knees were bare, the light hair that covered the rest of his long, leanly muscled legs worn away from his habit of prayer.

"I'll be honest with you, Aeryn. For all that you can be lively and that you occasionally kick, sharing a bed with you is not actually my idea of torture." Sebastian let his hands trace over the soft skin of her hip, her shoulders. His lips followed the breadth of a rounded scar on the left side, remnant of a Tal-Vashoth spear thrust, smiling at the answering tickle of her mouth across his collarbone. "I did not intend...to upset you so."

Aeryn’s fingers played, of their own volition, over his stomach, drawing small shapes in the line of cinnamon colored hair that trailed down. He deserved to know the truth of what she’d been afraid of. "I know. I wouldn't have gotten so upset, if I didn't think that maybe…maybe you're right. About how Bethany will feel, I mean." 

Well, that was a concession anyway, Sebastian thought then shot up straight at her next words. "Do you think she'll insist on going back to the Circle?"

Maker, he hadn't even thought of that. "No. _Mo chridhe_ , you'd know her better than I would, but...we won't _let_ her. Even here, with Alistair's decree." Sebastian paused and then added. "We'll keep her safe, Aeryn. And then she can help us, either to start a new place for mages in Starkhaven or to teach our children, don't you think? Because...no matter what I think of...other things your father did, he clearly did a fine job teaching Bethany." He leaned over and snagged the coverlet and a sheet off the floor and settled back with her on the pillows, tucking the soft woven fabrics around them. 

At least he saw that much. "He did. Bethany...she liked teaching." Pillowing her head on his chest, Aeryn yawned, the remnant of the firelight glinting off the crisp hair as she splayed her fingers through it. "I'm sorry I slammed a door on you. Although why you chose to sleep on your knees..." 

Sebastian was philosophical about it as he wiggled a space out in the featherbed for his shoulders, "Ah, well. I imagine I'll survive it, wasn't the first time."

"Oh?"

"I wasn't always so devoted in my prayers, if you'll recall. It was as good a time for a nap as any when I was young." 

It baffled her, though. "Still, there wasn't a good reason for it tonight."

"I couldna sleep in that bed wi'out you, _mo chridhe_. Nor any other," he confessed. It was her turn to sit up in surprise, to look at his face and see truth written in his eyes. "I slept alone and lonesome too long, Aeryn, dreaming of you in my arms. I willna go back to that for any reason." _And should you chase me from your bed I will sleep at your feet._

His honesty rendered her speechless. So she leaned in and kissed him, instead, softly, gently, sketching the lines of his face with her fingertips until she found her voice again. Against his lean, stubbled cheek she whispered, "You are the sweetest man, Sebastian Vael. Good and true. I have no idea what I did to deserve you, but greedy soul that I am, I will have you and keep you and never let you be alone, my own." _Never. I vow it._

>>>\----- >

It was a quiet group that gathered on the stairs of the Vigil the next forenoon, heavy damp in the air threatening to turn a soft day into a drenching one. The early morning departure had flown by the wayside, when Bethany alone of them managed to make the breakfast table. Sebastian had taken advantage of the rare treat of waking up to a sleepy, cuddly Aeryn still sprawled across him and rolled her back into the feathers to wake her in a slow, sweet romp. 

Merrill joined them at second breakfast with a self-satisfied little smile on her sweet mouth and a pensive sort of look in her hazel eyes. Varric and Fenris came down the stairs one after the other, in a plodding manner; their card games had kept them up nearly to dawn. But the hot food soon roused them all and they were eager to be on the road, even with the rain and the seeping chill. 

Meridan gave Aeryn a packet of letters and a small package to carry to the Queen. "You are welcome to return to the Vigil, Lady Hawke, should you ever find yourself in our part of Ferelden, again. With any luck, our friend will have regained himself, soon." 

Aeryn extended her leg in an elegant curtsy, worthy of any court. "I shall carry your greetings to the King, Warden Commander. Thank you kindly for your hospitality." It was a formal leave-taking, to cover for the more casual one that had occurred when Aeryn picked up the particular message for Alistair, now tucked safely into an inner pocket in her jerkin. 

"Prince Vael, we hope to bring the Grey Wardens back to Starkhaven, soon." It had surprised Sebastian to learn that the Wardens had been turned out of his city a few years ago.

"It is my hope, as well, Commander. The Order has always held high honor in my homeand it will be among my first acts to restore their rightful place." 

Varric kissed her hand and received a delighted smile, "You are a charmer of the first water, messere. I look forward to reading the books you have left me." 

"I do my humble best, my lady." 

Fenris was sent off with a polite, carefully distant smile from the Warden Commander and a rather enthusiastic hug from the sturdy blonde swordswoman, Terri. When Aeryn shot him a curious eyebrow, he shrugged nonchalantly. "Isabela wanted a story of my conquests. I thought it rude to disoblige her." Aeryn snickered as he returned Terri's wave.

It was Merrill's leave taking that made Aeryn most curious, though. She got a rakish bow from a lean, dark elvhen archer with a pirate's smile and a kiss on the cheek from Meridan, who whispered something in Merrill's ear that made her nod and whisper back.

Aeryn let it lie until they were well away from the Keep and back on the Imperial Highway, but curiosity got the better of her, finally. They had a scouting escort, but the warden was playing least in sight, meaning only to be a warning in case of another attempted ambush. "Merrill? Did you make a new friend or two amongst the Wardens?"

"Well, you know. He's an interesting fellow, that Tornill. He came from Antiva, before."   
"As long as you had a good time, kitten."

Merrill hesitated, her eyes cast far down the misty road, before she spoke again. "I did, indeed. I think...I think it wouldn't be a bad thing, to have a sense of belonging, the way he says the Wardens do." 

"Ah. No...no, I don't suppose it would."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Author’s Note: And so, farewell Anders, poor mad fellow. A brief adventure in Amaranthine awaits our companions and then on to Denerim for winter quarters._
> 
> _Thanks to all of you who have favorited and followed the continuing adventures of Aeryn and her Sebastian. Hope you continue to enjoy the story!_  
>  Sebastian occasionally breaks out a term or two in Starkish, the Thedan equivalent of Scottish Gaelic in my Shelterverse (all errors in translation are my own.:  
> rùn biodagain: my lovely little dagger  
> leannan: beloved, sweetheart  
> mo chridhe: my heart  
> barr maiseach: so beautiful  
> à ruin: my love  
> Meridan is Orlesian and so she too, speaks in tongue.  
> ou est tu, ma p'tit?: Where are you, my little one? 


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  ** _Author’s Notes:_** Back to Amaranthine. Warnings for descriptions of child abuse, past and in story. Also canon typical violence and adult situations. 
> 
> Many thanks to mille libri for her brilliant beta, though all mistakes are my own.
> 
> Bioware owns all, I’m just happy to play in the sandbox.

The rain came and went as they made the walk back to Amaranthine. 

It made for a quieter group, as Varric sulked about being wet, instead of telling stories or singing, and the rest huddled into their hooded cloaks. Except for Aeryn, who was privately reveling in the fresh rain and the green, old familiar feel of wet Ferelden. Simpler to keep watch now, everything along the road was huddled away from the dismal day. They had an escort from Meridan, as well, as back-up and forewarning. 

Sebastian scanned the forward way, his eyes lighting on Aeryn who, in an unguarded moment, had her almost-snubbed nose up in the air, practically twitching like a hunting cat's whiskers, her lips curving in a twist with her sodden hair streaming around her face as her hood had fallen back. She was soaked, but content, and the sight of her so left him curiously warm, as though he'd taken a swallow of the Starkhaven whiskey in the flask he'd pulled out of his pack this morning. He breathed in as well, smelling wet leaves and mud and damp stone and forest. It wasn't a bad smell. Pleasant really, in a way, but he thought perhaps she was finding something in it he didn't.

Closer to her, Fenris had noticed as well and groused, "Do you smell anything besides mud, Hawke?"

She turned on her heel, walking backwards for a moment as she sniffed again and considered. "There's hickory smoke over that way, someone's smoking meat. And making cider, don't you smell the apple mash?"

The elf shook his head, pushing dripping bangs off of his forehead. "A nose like that would have made you a fine asset in the wine trade."

"I'll sniff you out a case of something nice in Denerim to keep you company in your winter quarters. Just don't make me drink the stuff." Aeryn turned a frown down at his bare feet, picking around icy puddles in the more sunken patches of the ancient Tevinter stone highway. "You need boots, Fenris. A Ferelden winter is no joke."

"I will survive." He glanced down at his long bare toes and grimaced at the flecks of mud. And the slight blue cast of his skin.

Aeryn rolled her eyes. "You'll end up with pneumonia and frostbite and it'll be me forcing chicken broth down your gullet. Merrill?"

"Hawke's right, it's true. Even the People wear boots in Ferelden during the winter. I had a lovely pair lined in rabbit fur." Fenris grumped at the little witch delicately balancing along the higher middle ridge of the road.

"Never mind them, Fenris." Bethany called. "I have a good potion for healing pneumonia. It is primarily fish based, though," she finished thoughtfully, with a saucy tilt to her head.

Sebastian could see the elf shudder. "I would rather suffer Hawke's nursing, thank you."

Aeryn gave him a wide eyed hurt look that was rather spoiled by her smirk. "Are you telling me I'm a poor comfort to a sick friend?"

"I'm telling you the last time you tended me I ended up half drowned in soup and tea and coated in camphor grease." Aeryn remembered that. That first winter he'd joined them, still so mistrustful of magic that he'd not take a potion or let Anders or even Bethany try and help him out. She'd spent a week at the dank mansion keeping her new sword hand from coughing himself to death.

"You got well, though." Thank the Maker. She'd been on the verge of knocking Fenris senseless and running for her healer when the fever had finally broken.

"Yes. Out of self-defense."

She spread her hand across her heart dramatically, "Oh, I'm wounded. Such a dastardly reward for my good deeds. Am I not to be defended?" Aeryn glanced around at her merry band. Even Bethany was shaking her head, having suffered her sister’s attempts at physicking in their early childhood, which mostly involved being forcibly restrained in bed, wrapped in a layer of bandage and podged with bits of leaf and mud, pretending to be poultices. "Sebastian?" Aeryn appealed to her lover for support with a cajoling hand.

"Ah. As I recall you left the country last time you thought I was ill." He grinned at her though and she smiled back, not taking it amiss. Sebastian recalled though, the way Aeryn’s deadly hands had been soft and cool on his heated skin. She might have been a poor nurse at one point, but she'd learned differently in the years between. Learned something of gentleness, perhaps.

"I did leave you in the hands of a good cook, though."

"The soup you made was good, too. What little I tasted and didn't get poured down my front." Fenris allowed. Aeryn gave him a shove and he nimbly avoided the next puddle. "Ah, but you had a sweet bedside manner, it was almost worth the scalds, Hawke." He had trusted Hawke after that, the way she’d dealt with his illness, trusted that she would not take advantage. Wouldn't subject him to magic on just any whim. They hadn't yet been friends, neither of them quite capable of it then, but it had been a start. 

 

The banter continued as they loped along now, and even Varric, having taken a bolstering nip from Sebastian's flask, joined in at the last, deigning to tell one of the new stories he'd heard from Oghren. It was a minor tale of the Blight cycle, about the Hero and the time she and her companions had accidentally become lyrium smugglers. The rain had spattered to a halt and wisps of rich blue were showing through the clouds above them and he was just coming to the bit of the story where Mahariel had found her buyer hiding in a wardrobe in Kinloch Hold, when they got to the gates of the port city. The warden scout who had been accompanying them waved farewell and went off to deliver his messages and run his errands.

They passed through the open gate with a nod from the guard. They were all cloaked again against the inclement weather and looked no different from the other smattering of folks forced by necessity to leave their dry homes and venture out into the wet.

As she walked through the city, Aeryn glanced around the damp streets, people appearing now as the mists cleared. She'd been rather sure she'd see Macie again, tagging at her heels and asking about joining up. The girl hadn't struck her as being wishy-washy in her interests. But if Macie was following them, she was a better tail than Aeryn had been at that age, which was saying something. And, speaking of light-footed, Sebastian had abandoned his rear position and caught up with her, setting his hand into its place in the small of her back.

"What are you looking for, _leannan_?" 

"Who, actually." An elegant eyebrow was cocked at her, curious, and Aeryn resisted the urge to smooth it straight. "My little messenger, Macie. I figured she might look us up again."

"Have you changed your mind, then, about taking on an apprentice?"

"Oh, Void, no." He made an odd noise in his throat, almost disapproving. "Well, don't tell me you want me to take her?" Surely not. Sebastian couldn’t want her to start training up children in the way she’d been taught, not after what he’d said about Father.

Frowning a little, Sebastian asked, "I...well, would she not be better off with us than with a thieves' guild?" Aeryn looked a bit incredulous and he tried to explain. "I did do a bit of ministry in Darktown, Aeryn. I know what happens to little girls with no patrons."

"Love, I hate to tell you, but there are probably a dozen girls in this city that are going to end up as whores or on a gibbet for theft. I'm certainly not taking all of them in." She said the last gently, but firmly.

"Yes, but she..." Macie had reminded him a bit of Aeryn, with her grin and her sharp chin and the way she'd ducked into the crowd and, fine. He knew better than to make that parallel. "You talked to her. She just seemed an interesting little thing."

Varric had been listening and chose to toss his two bits in. "She was that. Looked like she'd have a good hand, too."

"Oh, Maker. Not you, too."

"Hey, you had a whole line of kids following you around in Kirkwall playing messenger. Don't tell me you wouldn't find it useful to have someone to boss about and run your errands?"

"This from the man that used to have them stashed in brothels and in dark corners so you'd have gossip to pull strings with. If she came with us, she'd be _ours_. We'd be feeding her and schooling her and whatnot, not just making sure she had a decent meal now and again and a few copper to spend. Not to mention, do neither of you recall that thievery is _illegal_?" 

Her friends turned disbelieving, highly amused looks at her. She sniffed. "I'm sure I don't know what you mean. I'm completely respectable, these days. Don't remember the last time I walked off with something that wasn't mine. That I didn't pay for. Eventually." Ah. That book on Starkhaven flora she’d picked up at the apothecary and stashed in her basket for safe keeping. She'd have to run in and take care of that, before they set sail. And also that poor, small, abandoned beautifully chased silverite knife she'd picked up at the Vigil. "Anyway, it appears to be moot, as Macie isn't here to ask."

Varric glanced around and nodded over at an urchin on the corner, in a too big cloak and a brown woven cap pulled low. "Five'll get you ten that that one could hustle your girl up pretty quick."

"She's not _mine_." 

But he was already walking over and calling out, "Hey, kid, c'mere!" Startled, the little boy looked at Varric with huge eyes and then turned tail and tried to run. Except that he ran straight towards Fenris, who stepped forward and grabbed him up by the scruff, with an expression of mild distaste.

"Lemme go, knifey. I didn't do nothin.' Leggo." Fenris held the child up off the ground.

"This one isn't as skilled as the girl seemed to be." The boy tried to kick him and Fenris shook him, slightly. "Be still, Hawke just wants to ask you a question."

"Fenris." Aeryn looked the boy over. He seemed far more scared than he should have been, his face going white and pinched. "Hey. That's not a nice word. Don't use it anymore, alright? He's right, though. And I'll give you a copper for your trouble, even." The little boy redoubled his efforts, forcing Fenris to grab him with both hands to keep from being kicked.

"What in the Void is wrong with you?"

"Don't want your money, bitch. You got Macie in trouble!"

"What do you mean, I got her in trouble?" Aeryn's voice went hard and quiet and the boy fell still, his light green eyes huge at the change.

He answered her in a whisper, though. "She took your bloody coin and Roget beat the shit out of her for it."

"Where is she?" The child shrank away as best he could, being held like a half-weight kitten. "Tell me. _Now_."

"Aeryn... You're scaring him." Sebastian spoke softly.

She blinked, realizing she'd been looming menacingly over the scrap of a boy and purposely softened her voice and stance. "I'm sorry, pup. Take me to her and I'll see if I can help?"

He tried to get away once, but Aeryn snagged him by the collar again and he seemed to give in. They were led through a series of increasingly dark, cramped, smelly alleyways, finally making it to a little doorway to the cellar of a tumbledown hovel. The room it opened on was as damp and fetid as anything she remembered from Darktown and frigid, to boot. And in the corner on a grubby pallet was Macie, looking very small under the ragged coverlets, her black hair matted and the rest of her black and blue and bloody and shaking.

"Shit."

"Holy Maker, preserve us." Sebastian had shifted to stand next to the boy, blocking him from the door, assuming Aeryn would want to talk with him again. 

"Bethany..." But her sister was already moving, the mana drawing up around her. Merrill conjured a small magical fire in the stone-flagged corner of the room, already marked with soot and ash as the usual place, to boil water for cleaning.

Bethany's soft, gentle hands moved over the frame gingerly. "Oh. Oh, Aeryn."

"Can you help her?"

Bethany closed her eyes and breathed in. "I think so. Yes. It's just....oh, she hurts, so." The magic pulsed around her, warm and giving and Macie stopped shaking, at least.

"Get her fixed up then." Aeryn didn't take her eyes off the little bruised body, but she turned slightly towards their escort. "Tell me what happened."

"We're not supposed to take jobs. Not legit 'uns. She's done it before and Roget was..."

"Making an example of her." He nodded, clearly terrified that he was going to be next. "Yes. Well, I think he's going to regret that, pup. Varric?"

"Yeah, Hawke?"

"I need to know whatever you can tell me about the guild here and this Roget. Can your contacts help?"

"I'll find out what you need to know. What are you going to do?"

Aeryn looked up at him, with a sharp smile and glittering eyes, and the boy plastered himself to the wall to get away from her. Sebastian found it a sensible reaction and patted the lad's shoulder sympathetically, but Sebastian had no sympathy for the man. He who had done such a thing deserved to meet Aeryn in a dark mood. "Well, first I'm going to ask my friend Ser Oswald whether or not he thinks the thieves' guild has gotten above themselves."

"And if he says they haven't?"

"Well, then. Accidents do happen, now, don't they? Meet me back at the tavern, soon as you can. Fenris, go with him and peel off to tell Isabela." The two slipped back into the alley.

Merrill was making cooing sounds over the girl, carefully cleaning blood away and daubing her with elfroot salve as she went. The swollen little face was barely recognizable, the fragile jaw out of joint and the formerly sharp nose mashed to the side.

"Beth?" Aeryn felt the itch in her fingers, the old familiar need for steel and action, the curling chaos bubbling closer to her surface. Wait. Just wait, plan, make sure. And then, oh, it had been a _long_ time since anything was this straight forward. 

"She was bleeding internally. I think...I think it's stopped, but...Aeryn, I'm not..." Bethany shook her head, regretting as she had before that her talent lay in other lines of magic. 

Not Anders, to be able to see the inner workings of the body with that spirit connection that true healers had. Aeryn rubbed her hood over her hair, drying the last of the rain, sighing, as her sister continued. 

"I know I stopped the infection, though, her fever's going down already."

''Can we move her? I'd rather get her to the ship before I start this."

Merrill glanced at Beth, who nodded as her hands continued to drift. The elf took the end of the small nose and yanked, straightening it as Beth laid another heal spell to set it. Macie moaned pathetically, but fell back into insensate oblivion almost immediately. Sebastian thanked the Maker for small favors.

"Well, that's got her breathing better anyway. I don't know, sister. I imagine she'd be better off somewhere warm and clean, at least." No matter how this ended for Macie, that at least would be true.

Sebastian knelt down beside the boy. "Lad, is the Chantry here a safe place?" The boy scrubbed his sleeve across his snotty freckled nose and nodded, wide eyed at the magic, but reassured at least that these strange folk were trying to help. He turned reddened eyes towards Sebastian, sizing him up with a skeptical glance at the archer's armor before shrugging.

"Yeah. The biddies bleat on at ya a lot, though. 'At's why most of us don' stay there."

"Tonight's going to be a bad time for you to be on the streets, aye? Can you get your friends to stay the night wi' the mothers, at least?"

"Ser...what's your sharper gonna do to Roget?"

"Ah, well..."

Aeryn settled beside them on her haunches and handed the boy a roll stuffed with sausage, left from their lunch. He didn't even look before he tore into it, eyes wary on the woman before him.

She looked levelly at the lad, her hard edge muted and the darkness pushed back for now, and said in a conversational tone, "I'm going to have his guts for garters, pup. And that's if he's lucky."

"Oh. Good." And there was a cold hate in the young voice that sent Sebastian's gut clenching. Aeryn saw it, the way Sebastian’s eyes dropped to the floor. 

"Do you think I should not?" She would, anyway. But she wanted him to understand. There was no justice here, for someone like Macie. The Thieves’ Guild would cover Roget’s tracks, hide him away from any guardsman's hunt, and he'd just pop up again like a toadstool. 

Sebastian glanced back at the still little body on the pallet and shifted his shoulders, scars and memories suddenly tight across them, and looked back at her. “No. I think ye must." 

Aeryn caught the dark, serious gaze and had to swallow back an abrupt spurt of incoherent rage that ran through her at the haunting in their hooded depths. 

She set her hand on Sebastian’s, strong warm fingers curling over his, until he turned his hand up and clasped back, briefly. _Oh, my love. I’m so sorry._ Aeryn didn’t speak though, not wanting to draw attention to him. 

Sebastian stood, then, going to his camp kit and pulling out the small kettle, filling it from his waterskin and setting it next to the fire to boil. Working, something useful to do would help him keep it away. 

The memories snuck back up on him, anyway. It had surprised Sebastian, how strong they were in this cold, lonely room. He’d lain alone, that last time, for a night. Aching, bloody. Too tired in his soul to move, before his old nan had come up to bandage him up and keep him fed until he’d healed, until the guards had been called to take him, disgraced and an exile to Kirkwall and the Chantry. Yes, Sebastian understood the boy, too well. _Maker, help me forgive him. Again_.

Aeryn watched Sebastian’s smooth movements from the corner of her eye, saw him reach up to touch the small scar on his neck, as she listened to Bethany and Merrill continue to work and the boy eat. It added yet another layer to what she meant to be doing. 

There were two options. She could simply stalk the bastard and cut his throat, leaving his useless corpse to feed the crows. Easiest. Simplest. Cleanest. But if his second was no better, she wouldn't be helping the ones she'd have to leave here. Or, she could take in her companions and level the guild. But that would leave a power vacuum, besides undercutting the black market, leaving orphans and widows and setting off who knew what ripples.

The water boiled and Sebastian brought Bethany and Merrill each a restorative cup and then held one out to the boy, who cupped it in his hands for warmth. "What's your name, lad?"

"Tibert, but they just call me Tibby."

"Tibby, you need to go on, now, after you finish your tea. Get your friends safe. Can you keep out of Roget's hands that long?"

"Yes ser."

"Good lad. Now, what can you tell us that will help?"

 

>>>\------ >

Sebastian carried the little girl and reflected on what Tibby had told Aeryn, how the second, a woman named Perri, was a hard hearted woman and a drunk, but that the next two were decent sorts, from a scamp's perspective, at least less likely to hit for no reason and more apt to divvy up a take fairly, to allow the children to take the small jobs that made their lives a little easier.

He stepped carefully with Macie, now wrapped in his spare tunic and Aeryn’s cloak, in his arms, taking good care not to jostle her. Bethany had healed the jaw and her twisted, broken arm and two ribs and Merrill had spooned healing potion into the girl’s mouth, but their work was easily undone at this point.

Touch and go that Macie would survive at all, even with careful tending, considering the extent of her injuries and the day she'd laid on that filthy pallet with little assistance, the other children too afraid to get her any aid but their own. 

And for the first time, it struck Sebastian what it might mean to travel this dangerous path of battle and coup without a healer like Anders. Images of Aeryn, bleeding and bruised, flashed in his mind and he swallowed hard, pushing them away.

Aeryn stalked around them in a protective forward circle, clearing their path with a clear intent to do damage written across her features. Without her cloak, she made no attempt to hide what she was capable of as they made their way to the docks. It had startled Sebastian the first time he'd seen her do this, change her small figure in such a subtle way that yet produced such an overt sense of menace. As though she would spin into violence and mayhem at the least provocation. It had not been heeded often in Kirkwall, much to many a villain's regret, but it was tellingly effective here. Merrill watched their backs while Bethany kept her eye on Sebastian’s burden, looking for any sign of crisis.

The gloomy afternoon was turning into dusk by the time they got to the dockside gate. Aeryn took a moment to speak to the guard on the gate. She commiserated with him about the terrible posting here by the damp, windy dockside and discovered, with only a touch of guile, that Oswald had been given the 'easy' post up on the sheltered southern battlement. She returned to her companions, "Take Macie to the boat. I'm going to talk with Ser Oswald."

"Wait for us, Aeryn." The sharp chin lifted and set and he could see her hands twitch, again, eager to be in motion, to have steel in her palm. He asked again, quietly, willing her to answer him, though he could see it in her eyes, glinting colorless in the torchlight; she wanted to be hunting. "I'll go get Fenris and Isabela. We'll be right back."

"Meet me up there." When he opened his mouth, she shook her head, snapping the words as an order. "We're wasting time. Meet me.” Taking a breath, she spoke with less force, “I promise, alright? I won't go on alone. Beth, do you need Merrill?”

"I'm of more use to you, Hawke." Bethany nodded her agreement with the elf and Aeryn watched them disappear into the fog that hadn't dissipated so close to the water.

She slipped into the shadow, not realizing that Sebastian had turned back to ask her again to wait.

Oswald was on the battlement and though the grizzled older guard startled when she appeared suddenly, an experienced hand going to his sword, he greeted her companionably enough. Aeryn moved into the light cast off by the firepit and he saw her blades and set face. "What is it, Mistress? Have you run into some trouble, then?"

"I have a question, Ser, about a man named Roget." Aeryn kept her voice nonchalant and sent her features blank.

"Oh. That's a name that's often found mixed with trouble. He's a wicked lad, our Roget."

Aeryn did not mince her words. "I will see him dead. Would he be missed much, do you think?"

Oswald looked her over, rubbing his fingers across his mouth. "Well, he's got his...supporters. His father is...ah...somebody." One hand slid over the other, in the old signal for someone born on the wrong side of the blanket.

Void. Roget was a noble bastard. 

"Have you crossed his path? He's a poor one to be on the crossways of."

"I'll tell you true, Ser Oswald. So am I." Aeryn's eyes gleamed in the sudden pitch flare from the pit and the guard nearly took a step back as her shadows flickered around her.

"What's your name, lady?" He asked it softly.

"I hope you haven't heard it, Ser. But it's Hawke." From his sudden intake of breath and the way his creased face wrinkled, he had.

"It's not all bad that I've heard." Oswald assured her. "King Alistair claims you as a friend of the throne, sent word across the country that you were to be allowed entry in port if you needed it. And the Captain just put up a notice in the barracks that you and yours cleared out a patch of darkspawn and were to be given all courtesy." That must have been one of the messages the warden scout carried, Aeryn thought.

"You have heard a bad thing or two, though?"

He cleared his throat and nodded. "A notice went through a week or two ago about some...crimes you might be connected to. A theft and the murder of a duke in Orlais. And that you led a gang of thieves and murderers in the Marches. I'll tell you, the king and the arlessa's opinions mean a mite more to us here than a piddling notice from those fops in the Marches. But if it's thieving you're doing, Mistress...if that's why you want Roget...to take his place?"

"I promise you it is not. I mean only to remove him and possibly his second. Unless it would be better for your Captain that I rid him of the guild altogether?"

Oswald drew a whistle through his teeth. "Just you, Hawke?"

Aeryn grinned at the guard, humorlessly, "Only if it's just one or two. For the whole guild, I will take backup."

The guard rocked back on his heels, considering before he spoke slowly. "Did you ever, when you were a girl, build a house with straws and then go about pulling them out, one here, one there, to see would the whole thing crash in on you?"

She nodded, seeing where he was going. "My father taught me that game. He was...concerned with outcomes." And, Blighted _Void_ , she wished she'd paid better attention to straws in Kirkwall. But she knew now.

"I think my captain would tell you that to take the whole guild just now, would be a bit like pulling half the straws at once. But for me, Hawke, I would prefer you not go alone even for only one or two."

A warm lilt spoke from the doorway, with just a hint of resignation. "Oh, I think she willna be on her own, Serah. One, two, or the whole blighted pack of knaves."

Oswald glanced over the group, uncloaked and armed to the teeth. It would have to be admitted that he lingered a bit on Isabela’s ample display and the pirate sent him a friendly wink. "Can I ask you why you've bothered, Hawke? What's Roget done to catch your eye?"

"He laid hands on one of mine. A little girl, local. A runner." And because this was not Kirkwall and she did not want to lump Amaranthine in with that tainted place, she asked. "If I brought him to you?" 

To his credit, the guard didn't try and lie, just shook his head briefly, regretfully. Roget'd be out again tomorrow, thanks to his connections. Then he spoke as if she hadn't asked. 

"Ah. Well, that's his poor luck then. I'd start at the Rampant Sailor off of the western square, were I you. Happy hunting, Mistress."

Varric met them at the Crown and as they walked he told her about his discoveries. “The guild used to be a decent bunch. Honor among and all that. But, things apparently went a little batshit around here not long ago. A rogue’s war. The old thief master got sick and wouldn’t let go of his seat and his seconds started turning on each other, to earn the spot. Roget was last man standing when the master finally keeled over. That was a couple of years ago.”

“What’s he like, besides being a child beater and a bastard?”

"Black haired, green eyed and mad as a half-skinned snake, from all descriptions, Hawke. Scrawny, has a wrecked knee, but doesn’t slow him down. He’s known for a fast stick and a knack for having interesting things fall in his lap, thanks to his daddy. His second is going to seed pretty fast, underneath him. Fake red hair, generally has a bottle on her. Not a fighter so much, more known for her fast hands with the take.”

“Left or right?”

“Right. But, Hawke…”

“Watch the left, too.” She was perfectly capable of killing with both hands. It took little to imagine another might be as well. 

“There you go.”

And then they found themselves outside the Rampant Sailor. Raucous music spilled out of the door and the windows were paned in obscuring diamonds of various shades of red, painting the glisten cobblestones with a lurid light. The hanging sign depicted a leering navvy riding a busty ship’s figurehead.

"Aeryn...this is a..."

"Brothel? House of ill repute? _Whoooorehouse_?" Isabela supplied graciously, apparently deciding Sebastian couldn't pick a description. "Choir Boy, surely a man who can tell our fearless leader to, what was it you said the other night? Oh yes, that's right...’Spread those pretty white thighs, _leannan_. I’m going to’... mmnph...!" Fenris had covered her mouth with his hand and gave her a sharp warning glare. She nipped him and smiled sweetly when he let go, swearing. 

Sebastian was fairly sure he was going to murder the woman.

Aeryn, however, wasn't listening to their byplay. She was looking at the brothel with a mix of calculation and wicked glee. "Isabela? How do you feel about a bit of dress-up?”

“Ooh. Are we role-playing? I should have brought my…”

“Bela, I will let you use any innuendo you’d like tomorrow. I have business tonight, right? Either get your head in or go back to the ship.” Aeryn’s dead flat tone brought the pirate up short and drew Sebastian's eyes to her face. There was a distant look about her, as if she were not quite standing with them. As if the past was easing in on her, drawing her back to old habits.

With a put upon “humph”, Isabela nodded. "So how are we playing this? Want to go in dressed as whores and lure him into a sideroom? Oooh, or we could send the boys in, nice tight breeches and all oiled up?" She eyed Sebastian speculatively and he returned her gaze impassively. "Make him leave his belt buckle on. Just in case the bastard's a pervert, too."

"You know I don't work that way, playacting. Although, I _did_ enjoy that time I got to backhand you across the mouth for giggles and profit." So maybe she had been listening, earlier.

"Someday you're going to realize that this can be fun." 

Aeryn smiled her feral little smile, the reddish light from the windows playing across her face as she led them around the building into a dark, narrow alley. "Oh, I plan on having fun."

Isabela shuddered. "But _your_ sort of fun is just creepy for the rest of us." 

“Never mind, you can just back up Fenris, then, and block off this retreat. We need to get an eye in, have a look see, get some numbers. If Roget and Perri are both here we can get this done quickly, but I don’t really want to cause a fuss. We need to get them alone and cut them out. Oswald seemed to think things would fall in nicely after that. Varric..."

"I'll go in." 

Aeryn drew up, her distance suddenly gone. "Sebastian..." 

"I want to help and I'm not much good to you, tactically, in this sort of fight. But I know what to look for in there and how to act."

He was right. The alley was too restricting for an archer to have a good vantage for his bow work. Sebastian could shoot in a narrow space, his accuracy unhampered. But speed and spread would suffer. Varric was actually the better range man in this scenario, if she needed it. And Aeryn had no intention of letting Roget die as easily as he would if Sebastian simply sent a neat, impersonal arrow through his eye. Void. 

This would all be so much simpler if it was just her. So very like the old set ups she used to run for Meeran. Drop into a shadow, wait for the mark and slit an unsuspecting throat or shiv a distracted drunk. Nothing but her wicked sharp blades and the dark that called. 

But they wanted to help. Sebastian wanted to help. Maker.

Sebastian watched Aeryn, her dark red head bowed as she worked out the plan. When she looked up, the fine gray eyes were opaque. 

"Fine. Here's what we'll do."

Aeryn did have Sebastian remove his plate and mail, leaving him in his leathers alone. The armor was so unique, that she was worried that some account of his presence in the Sailor might get out. The Prince had a reputation to consider and overcome. Not to mention, "The only man who would walk into a whorehouse wearing Andraste's face on his crotch, darling man, is either there for the preaching or the perversion. Neither one is helpful, just now, hmm? Unless you _want_ a lapful of slut begging to be punished for her iniquity?” Aeryn sent him an arch look. Ah. That would be what he got for _asking_ to be sent into a brothel.

“You do realize it’s a belt buckle, no’ a codpiece, right?” He took the offending item off, though, setting into a pile for Merrill to keep an eye on. 

Wondering which verse was the best for this situation, Sebastian pushed through the door, paused a minute at the odor of smoke and bodies that hung in the air, then aimed for the bar and the madam leaning against the corner, dark hair piled on top of her head and a magenta gown setting off what had once been abundant charms. 

The main room wasn't crowded, just a few customers and a handful of bored employees scattered among the tables. Up on a balcony, a group of musicians was providing a bit of overly cheerful entertainment. No different than the dozens of these places Sebastian had frequented in past times. Maybe a little less upscale, as he'd been determined to spend as much coin as possible. He bought a round genially and then whispered into the madam’s ear, slipping a purse into the high thigh split of her skirt, dexterously tucking it into her tied garter. Aeryn was not the only one with old habits to call upon. 

The woman eyed him coolly from black eyes under heavy brows as she judged the weight she’d just added. “No muss in my place or it’ll be doubled and I’m callin’ the guard.”

“My lady, you have my word as a gentleman.” She palmed the note he'd slipped under her elbow and waved her other hand, and a few new girls came down the stairs. Sebastian took advantage of the distraction to scope out the room, easily finding a man of Roget’s description sitting with a half naked blonde on his lap and a woman that had to be Perri, with a truly horrendous dye-job turning her hair an unnatural shade of red, slumped over her gin on his other side. There were three others set up around the room in an almost casual pattern that indicated that they must be the thief master’s back-up. Now and again, various people, including two small children not much older than Tibby, came by his table to drop off bags and take messages. When the bartender turned his back after setting up a tray of ale, Sebastian snagged one, as he casually tipped the vial Aeryn had handed him into the rest. 

A bubbly looking little frail, with curly brown hair and a well-filled bodice split down to her navel, took the tray from the bar to deliver drinks to the waiting customers and gave him an appreciative whistle. Sebastian shot her an old, dangerous grin, sending her brown eyes wide with anticipation. "Needing some company, then? All's I got to do is hand over these to Roget's men and I'll be all yours, sweetie."

"Sounds well, dovey." He'd need a reason to leave the room. 

"Oooh. Foreign are you? Nice." She winked at him over her shoulder as she hoisted the tray up and sashayed off to deliver the goods.

A squeal rang through the room, bringing his head around. The plump blonde on Roget's lap was struggling as he laughed, a wiry arm clamped around her waist. Her blouse was sodden. Apparently the cur had poured his ale over her chest, not satisfied with the already near-transparent garment. Sebastian had to brace himself not to go to her assistance, reminding himself that she'd be free of the rotter soon enough. Perri hadn't even bothered to look up. She was flipping a coin back and forth across her knuckles, watching as though she was trying to snare herself in a trance. 

The curly top had returned, and Sebastian bought her a drink, a brightly colored cherry scented whiskey and at her encouragement, the same for himself. A hesitant sip nearly choked him with sweetness and harsh, poorly aged spirit, so he turned his attention to the woman, instead. She was very like the girls he'd run after before. Sebastian had been fond of the wild haired sparrow type, cheerful and bouncy. For a former priest, though, it was hard not to notice the dirt in the creases of her neck and the dark shadows under her eyes, the slight odor of acrid sweat under a haze of flowery scent. Too thin, the bones of her delicate wrists showing plainly under her freckled skin. Pity wrung Sebastian’s heart but he didn't allow it to show on his face, keeping his smirk in place. How old? Likely younger than she looked. 

Glancing up, it was plain that the drug Aeryn had decided on was taking effect already. The bodyguards were starting to look a little dazed. It would exacerbate the effect of the ale, is all, she'd said, respecting Sebastian's dislike for poison, making them feel as if they'd drunk a small keg as opposed to just one mug full. Time to go. Now...how to encourage Dovey...she'd liked his nickname...to move on to another room? Without actually touching her lasciviously, please. 

Sebastian ducked his chin and sent her an intense look under his brows. She giggled and asked, "You got a room upstairs, then? Or you just want ta..." Jerking her head to the side, she indicated one of the shadowy alcoves leading to the rooms set up for shorter arrangements. 

"Lead th’ way, dovey."

She did, taking him just past Roget and Perri. The second had roused herself to start fondling the blonde in the master's lap, and Roget looked happy enough with this turn of events. The prostitute looked miserable, under her layer of paint, gazing drunkenly off into the distance as she was manipulated. Sebastian resisted the urge to whisper an encouragement to her, sending a small prayer her way, instead. Maker. How many of the women he'd bought had worn faces like that, when he wasn't looking? He'd paid, often enough, even when he didn't have to, just for the added insult to his family name. Been drunk himself often as not as well, that last year, so he might not have seen if the girls were unhappy with his company. The madam noticed his exit and raised a finger when he caught her gimlet eye. Hopefully, that meant she'd send the note to Roget in ten minutes after Sebastian escaped.

Dovey brought him behind hanging draperies to one of the quiet rooms, a large chaise lounge, covered in worn leather in the corner the main focus. It looked clean at least. Small hand with ragged nails went to unfasten her kirtle and Sebastian laid a restraining hand on her wrist. "No need for that."

The girl looked up into a gentle smile, a world away from dark smirk the foreign charmer had worn earlier. "You don't wanna touch me tits? It's not much more coin than a plain fuck or a suck off, sweetie." 

Sebastian stoically forced back the shudder he felt crawl across his skin. "No’ here for that, either. I just needed to leave the bar, quietly." He glanced around the room, the other door and a window. "Does that window open?"

"Oi! Hey! You took me off the floor! I'll get in..." 

The small purse he dangled in front of her stopped her incipient rant as she snagged it and tucked it under her blouse. "Take your time. Have a nap, maybe." Here, he paused before he turned away and set his hand on her shoulder and raised his other in a gesture that had once been second nature. "Holy Maker bless you and keep you in His Light. Blessed Andraste, hear the prayers of this daughter." Leaning over, he kissed her lightly on the forehead, in peace. "Take care, dove. Thank you.” 

She watched the odd fellow jerk up the sash and slide out the opened window into the fresh night, her mouth gaping open.

Roget grumbled about being called away from his pleasure and he dragged Perri along with him, out of spite. One glance at his crew told him he was on his own, the lazy buggers. He'd have their ears tomorrow, once they sobered up. More fun that way, they'd squeal less with liquor dulling their senses. Still, a job was a job and no one would be messing with him. Being Bann Corin’s byblow was good for that and more. 

"Don't go anywhere, chuckie," he warned his whore and she simpered up at him with a giggle. He swaggered into the alley with Perri following at his heels. 

"Hey! Where are you then? Maker's Tainted Balls, if I got called out here for nothin' but a prank, I'm going to..."

"No prank, Roget." 

A hooded woman stood in front of him, as if she'd appeared out of thin air. He started back, stumbling over his second, but leered at her with a sly grin. Looker, this one. Shorter than him, which was nice. All curve underneath her leathers. He let his gaze travel upwards to her pale face and something cool trickled down his spine when he met her eyes. "What'cha want, little girl? Your message said you had a job for me."

"Not a job. Just another message." The voice coming from the dark red lips was low and quiet and he had to step forward to hear her. 

"What's that then?" Growling with menace, annoyed at being torn from his evening's entertainment. She’d be providing more than a sodding message. Those red lips curved in a smile and she sent him a coy shrug. He reached out to grab her wrist.

The woman moved like water, fast as a snake, and a crack of thunder sounded over them as the skies opened again. Sand in his eyes and a steel toed boot to his bad knee sent him crashing to his knees onto the slippery street. There was a wet _thuck_ sound behind him as a knife suddenly appeared, sticking out of Perri's throat, airy blood bubbling, the studded mace she carried clattering to the cobbles. 

Roget got his eyes cleared, though tears streamed down his face, and watched blearily as his second scrabbled at the small chased hilt, turning a nasty shade of purple before her raddled body slumped to the ground. “ _Bitch_! I’m going to…”

There was another boot to his chin, sending him sprawling. He felt hands yanking at him as the woman took a hold of his hair, hauling him up and bending his neck back. Rain was spattering on his face, pooling in his mouth and he sputtered and choked. One foot crushed his right hand as icy, silver gray eyes gazed down at him. He managed to pull his knife with his off hand, and jabbed it towards her, but a bolt caught him in the wrist. 

"My friend Macie does send her regards, Roget." There was a bright pain at his throat and she held him tightly as he lurched and twitched in her hands. He bled out looking up at a terrible, cold smile and the rain falling silver around them.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _**Author's Note** : Warnings for mentions of past child abuse._

Sebastian had barreled around the corner and given Aeryn the rundown on Roget, Perri and the others, then pulled himself up to the balcony overhead, for a decent vantage. He'd not seen Aeryn watch him jump up and reach for the railing, swing and then haul his long, lean body over the wrought iron with his innate sense of grace. Turning away from her archer then, with a picture of him that would stir her blood later when she wasn't so focused elsewhere, Aeryn made a mental note that wyvern leather, in a lovely chocolate brown, would suit him very nicely when she looked up the armorer that Meridan had recommended. Then, drawing up her hood, Aeryn disappeared into the shadow to wait. 

Watching, he knew where she was, in that point where the shadow was just a little too unnaturally...thick...for lack of a better word. Business, Aeryn had said to Isabela. And it occurred to Sebastian that he had never seen her at her work, in this manner. 

Battle, yes. Desperate, to the bone, endless fights. Scraps and alley brawls. The precise and elegant nature of her in motion against an enemy. The way she and Fenris dove into a pack of slavers like it was a game and a rare treat. That one horrible, nightmare inducing moment when he had triggered the empty weapon at her heart. All of these, Sebastian had seen. Some of those facets he had to admit he admired. But this was a job. One with a personal connection, but just a job. She was distant and cool, but not empty, taking in his information and glancing at the others to make sure they were in position before he'd looked up and decided to chance the balcony's strength. 

Roget had blustered into the alley from the brothel's side door. Sebastian was meant to be covering the alley entrance, in case of outside interference, but he had watched Aeryn instead, unable to resist the curiosity and knowing, too, that Fenris was blocking that way. Aeryn had allowed the man to grab her wrist, used it to twist him into her body. She'd spoken, Sebastian could just hear the murmur, but she'd turned the soft, low voice into a lure, to draw Roget so close to her that he forgot his danger. Isabela had hit the second in the throat with one of her curved throwing blades. The rain had started to fall. 

The black hood hid the gleam of Aeryn's mahogany hair from the light of the one torch that sputtered at the alley's mouth. Sebastian couldn't see her face, certainly not her eyes, just the lithe, dangerous grace of Aeryn's form as she reduced a master thief to a wreck in three sudden moves. From his vantage, Sebastian saw the man's hand move, but it was Varric who covered that angle and the dwarf's bolt had ruined Roget's attempt to fight back. Had Roget had seen her eyes, and what had they told him as the villain died, had Aeryn been anything to him but a faceless, anonymous embodiment of Death? Because that, Sebastian realized suddenly, was what an assassin - a good one - was. 

And it was over. Aeryn held the man, just a moment, ensuring his demise, and then let the body slump to the ground besides Perri's pitiful form. She wiped her knife on his jerkin and resheathed it, standing. And Sebastian caught just a glimpse of her face, then, in a flash of lightning. 

Eyes as cool and impersonal as any wolf's peered at him from under the hood. Then the flash faded and when he dropped to her side and looked carefully as she pushed back her hood, Aeryn was herself again, a soft glow in the grey depths and a wry twist on her lips. 

"Well, that's that. To be honest, I rather expected more. Hmph." She rifled through the villain's pockets. Bit of gold, a few trinkets. Nice dagger. Not a bad start to Macie's hoard. 

"Hawke." Fenris' deep warning was all the time she had to school her features into light distress. 

"Now, then. What do we have here?" 

Ser Oswald was walking up with two other men, one just a bit younger, but with more elaborate insignia indicating his rank. The other guard appeared to be a fairly new recruit, with an eager look about him. 

"Oh, Ser. I just came to speak with this man and he and his...lady... attacked me. I am afraid that I was forced to defend myself." Holding her wrist up in the light at the angle that would show its delicate structure most clearly, and the bruising redness where Roget had grabbed her, she heard Sebastian's hissed breath. 

Oh, the wicked little deceiver. Sebastian knew for a fact that Aeryn had been wearing her bracers when he'd gone _into_ the brothel. 

"Now, Mistress, I did warn you Roget was a mite touchy.” The guardsman’s mouth twitched as he looked the corpses over. “Ah. Poor bastard. Scared you badly, did he?" 

"Terribly." Aeryn bit her lip as she glanced away sadly and Sebastian saw the younger guard reach out as if he thought to console her, before remembering himself. Swallowing a smile, the archer heard Varric clear his throat and next to Fenris, Isabela shook her head at Merrill, who was about to speak. The elf subsided with a small huff of breath. 

The Captain was watching this play with some amusement just barely visible on his handsome, lined face. He ran a hand through crisp blond hair and bowed. "Mistress Hawke, I am Captain Aidan. I am...troubled that you encountered such a distressing event. Ah, in an alley. Behind a notorious brothel." 

"Is that where we are?" Wide, innocent gray eyes blinked. "Oh dear, Ser Oswald. You _might_ have mentioned...." 

Ser Oswald coughed. "My apologies. I thought you might just send the villain a message." 

Indicating the bodies at their feet, Aiden spoke, "Well, plain enough she did, guardsman. He seems to have received it. Just you, then? Not your companions?" The bolt was still in Roget's wrist. 

"Well, my friend here did take the message into the place. Goodness me, a brothel. No wonder you were such a long time." Aeryn tsked and was pleased to see Sebastian blush, just a wee bit. Purely for effect. "But, no, I'm afraid I alone am to blame for this...mess." Aeryn's voice dropped from the slightly breathless tone she'd affected and gazed at the Captain levelly. If there were repercussions she wanted them on her shoulders. "I will make a statement, if you require it for your records." 

Aiden stared back at her, assessing, then shrugged. "No need, my lady. He quite clearly attacked you, no doubt judging you by his own standards. You see, Roget here was something of a thief." 

"Oh? Gracious. No wonder he was so violent towards my young friend. Ser Oswald did mention the little girl to you?" 

"Yes. He obviously thought you meant him harm and sought to keep you quiet. Terrible thing about thievery. It does bring you into contact with all sorts of wicked persons. Makes you properly paranoid." 

"It's so true." 

"I hope the girl has found herself a better group of friends." 

"If she lives, I can almost guarantee it. I don't suppose there are any healers in Amaranthine, perhaps at the Chantry?" 

"No, my lady. I'm sorry. Closest would be the Vigil. We have a surgeon and a barber, plus an apothecary. A couple of hedge witches out in the country. But no proper healer." 

Well, there's that. Aeryn hoped Bethany was managing. "Ah, well. May we go now? I'm afraid I'm rather in need of a cup of tea." Sebastian set a supporting hand at her elbow and got a sweet smile. 

"Of course. I hope the rest of your stay in Amaranthine will be uneventful." Captain Aiden put a note of warning in his voice and Aeryn acknowledged him with a neat curtsy. 

"Thank you, Captain." You and me both, Captain. "Fare you well, Ser Oswald." The guard gave her a small salute, setting his hand over his heart. 

"Lady..." The young guard set a restraining hand on her sleeve and Aeryn glanced up at the…oh, very young man in surprise. 

"Yes, guardsman?" 

"Please...if this terrible thing has upset you too much, don't hesitate to seek guidance from Andraste and our Maker. They will comfort you in this darkness." 

Oh, dear. "Ah. I will certainly seek out my priest, ser. Should I need comforting. In the dark," she couldn't help but add, piously. Isabela spluttered behind them and Sebastian looked to be trying very hard not to turn the shade of a ripe tomato. "It's very kind of you to remind me," Aeryn did her best to be utterly sincere and the fellow nodded earnestly. 

"That's enough, Mort." The captain spoke as if he was resigned to his man's religious blandishments. Sighing, he said, "Come on, let's get these blighters cleared away before the girls see them and start screeching." 

Aeryn led the way out of the alley and through the glistening streets of Amaranthine. Isabela and Merrill were chortling madly by the time they got to the edge of the square, Varric's deep laugh joining them. Even Fenris had a half-smile on his lean features. 

"You ought to be spanked, talking to a pious man that way," Sebastian whispered into her ear, his hand set warmly in the small of her back. 

She sent him a coy look from under her lashes. "Are you offering?" Sebastian hmphed and she smirked. "Anyway, should I _not_ turn to you if I'm troubled? I'd hate to have to shock some other poor unsuspecting religious man with my dangerous ways. I've only just gotten you broken in." 

"You will keep your wicked tongue between us, if you've a thought for what's good for you." He almost managed a repressive glower trying not to laugh outright at the expression any poor priest or mother would likely wear while trying to maintain an impassively compassionate voice during any confession Aeryn might be tempted to give. 

"Oh, my. _Threats_." That earned her a low growl. "I promise to keep my wicked tongue all for you, my darling priest." The pink tip of said organ flicked out, briefly. Sebastian's hand skirted down to her backside to give her a swat and Aeryn chuckled. Oh, despite the grave matter that led them here, it was a thrill and a release to have performed a service to Amaranthine by ridding them of that lout. She hadn't felt this loose and free in longer than she cared to remember, actually. Maybe Alistair would have a few jobs of this sort lying around waiting for a willing hand. A lovely way to spend a winter.

By the time they returned to the boat, though, their mirth had dissipated in light of what might greet them. Aeryn went right down the hatch to the small cabin Sebastian had carried Macie down to at Bethany's order. Aeryn took a breath at what she saw when she pushed open the door.

Oh.

_Thank you._

The young girl was clearly recovering, though her eyes were still closed. The swelling and bruising to her face had subsided and Macie had regained a bit of her color. Bethany was sitting half asleep next to her on the wooden chair that had sat outside Anders' cabin, a book open in her lax hands and a few scattered potion flasks discarded on the table.

Sebastian whispered a prayer of thanks behind Aeryn as she crossed the decking to close Bethany's book. The sisters smiled softly at one another and Sebastian was struck again by the similarities that their disparate coloring usually hid. Bethany shot a questioning look at Aeryn and received a feral smile in return. It sent a smug note of satisfaction across the mage's lightly tanned face.

"How is she, then?"

"Better, thank the Maker. It was touch and go for a bit. I missed a bit of bleeding. One of her lungs collapsed. But it's fixed and she's actually sleeping as opposed to being unconscious."

"Well done, sister Beth." Bethany flushed a little at Aeryn's praise. "You should to go to bed if you can leave her. Oh...wait. She ought to eat, right? What do you want made up? Broth? Blanc mange? I can send someone out for ice."

Bethany nodded. "Broth, I think. I don't actually know anyone who likes blanc mange. Honey water. Maybe a nice custard for tomorrow, good and eggy. She needs feeding up."

"Easy enough. Actually, I've got a bit left from the chicken carcasses I boiled up for stew yesterday. Do you think she'll wake soon?"

"I don't want to leave her alone, though." Bethany put her hands behind her hips and stretched out her back and Aeryn slipped behind her to rub her shoulders, finding the tension and smoothing it away expertly. The younger sister sighed under the firm hands. He noted that there were familiar dark smudges under Bethany's golden brown eyes and a look of pallor and hollowness in her usually rosy cheeks Sebastian recalled seeing occasionally on Anders' face when he'd pushed himself too far.

Sebastian cleared his throat. "I'll stay." When they glanced up at him with twin surprised looks, he shook his head, amused. "I did assist with healer hall at the Chantry fairly often. I can manage to sit at the child's side and feed her a bit of broth."

"If you're sure..."

"Go and take your rest. I'll wake you if she seems to be uncomfortable." He flapped his hands in scooting motions and Bethany giggled softly.

Aeryn turned to him and watched as Bethany gathered her things and then left. Sebastian unbuckled the vambrace and his chestplate, the mail surplice and finally his jerkin and stacked them neatly, leaving him in his linen tunic, one of the ones she'd sewn before they left Kirkwall. The charcoal color suited him, too, though not so well as the russets and browns and blues. She'd noticed that the higher born men about Amaranthine were wearing a new style of long coat over more tailored waists as opposed to the doublets that had been popular in Kirkwall. Aeryn would have to see about outfitting her prince more suitably once they came to Denerim. No doubt Alistair's staff could point her to a decent tailor.

Noting her observation, said prince sent her a warm look from beneath his lashes. "Come here a moment, mo chridhe." Aeryn swayed closer and Sebastian caught her hand and pressed a kiss to the bruised wrist. With the other hand, and clever fingers, he twisted open a small jar of the elfroot salve Bethany had been using on Macie and rubbed a dollop of it into Aeryn's fine skin, soothing the purpling mark away. "There, now. That's better. And maybe next time leave your bracers _on_?" He put just a hint of an order in his tone. She risked herself too easily for his taste.

Shrugging, Aeryn rotated the joint, glad to have it healing. "Just in case I needed a bit of support for my claim." Sebastian snorted and she flashed her saucy smile at him.

"You're a wicked lass."

"Your wicked lass, though?" The husky whisper and downcast lashes had him pulling her close again.

"Oh, aye. And never you doubt it." He bent his head down to kiss her thoroughly before clearing his throat and setting her back. There was a little girl in the room with them, after all. "Off you go, _leannan_. Do you not have things to be doing, then?"

Sebastian's handsome face, lean and arrogant, was relaxed, the hauntingly blue eyes seemed clear. She couldn't tell. She'd have to ask.

Pensively, Aeryn questioned in a soft tone, "Are you well, my love?"

Sebastian blinked. Why would he not be? "I…think so. Why?"

Aeryn gave him a wan little smile and tipped her head, letting her bangs fall over her face. "Well, you've walked into a brothel and had some business with whores, drugged some cuthroats, then watched me kill a man in cold blood, tell a number of lies, and do a bit of corpse rifling, then humored me in a bit of irreverence. I can't imagine a more different night than your former life. I suppose I'm..." She paused, shrugging nonchalantly but with a still watchfulness behind her silvery eyes. "I just wanted to be sure that it wasn't more than you were comfortable with."

Aeryn startled a little at the sweetness of Sebastian's smile when he drew her to him and tugged her down to sit on his lap in the low wooden chair. The lilting voice rumbled against her cheek. "I gave a blessing and provided a bit of rest and quiet to a woman who needed them. Not to mention received a reminder as to why my rakehell's life was empty despite my desperate excesses. I put out of harm's way men who might have died tonight. I stood watch over my love while she destroyed a man who was a child beater and a womanizer and a murderer, no doubt. I listened to her take responsibility without any regard for consequences to herself. I watched her take a bit of ill-got coin from a cruel thief to help a young girl start over. I did remonstrate wi' you over your irreverence, and the Maker knows all piety takes a bit of time to take root. And now I'll give rest and respite to a healer and watch over one of the Maker's children. Go and make your soup, à ruin. I'm well in my soul." Sebastian took her face in his hands and kissed her softly, set her back on her feet and then settled his long frame into the chair looking perfectly at peace.

Aeryn's eyes were glowing when she left and it made his heart skip. She'd truly been worried. Now and again they would sneak up on these hard things, the differences between them. But, Sebastian thought, not as often as they used to. Aeryn trusted him now, to tell her the truth if he was having difficulties reconciling his heart. He trusted that she would show him enough of the emotions she actually felt to not hate the masks she wore so easily. He'd be lying to himself, though, if he said that the ease with which Aeryn switched between killer and the gentler friend and lover didn't yet concern him.

The ship rocked quietly in its mooring as Aeryn trotted down to the galley. The crew was mostly still ashore, but Isabela had sent the cabin boy out to gather them up. They had decided to stay in port until Macie woke and could give her own opinion about whether or not to come with them. She brushed the runes that would heat the pot of stew and stoked up the fire to reheat the broth. Sandal had done a bit of crafting, making the kitchen a bit more efficient, before they had set Bodahn and his savant son off at Cumberland.

She carried Sebastian a tray, with the broth and honey-water for Macie, some toasted bread, and a pot of tea. Aeryn watched his long fingers, rough with calluses but gentle and careful while dealing with the injured child as he rearranged the blankets. He spoke soothingly, half unconscious of himself, in the Starkish cradletongue that he often used with her, and Aeryn couldn't hide the soft smile it brought to her lips. Nor could she stifle the sudden ribbon of longing and sweet hope that curled up warmly just under her heart. Sebastian would be a lovely father someday, if she could ever bring herself to risk it. Oh. What a thought. Because Aeryn was, if she was honest with herself- just a little- afraid of it.

Aeryn excused herself after a few moments and left him to his ministry, going back to finish preparing a meal for the rest of them.

Sebastian went through his evening prayers, doing his best to be sincere about Roget and Perri and wishing he had gotten Dovey's real name, and was leafing through the book of medicinal spells that Bethany had left behind her, before he noticed that there were bright black eyes watching him suspiciously.

"Hello, Macie. D'you remember me?"

"You belong to that sharper that I did a job for. You're her man." The girl's voice was harsh as a crow's, remnants of sleep and the bruises that had ringed her throat not long before.

"That's right. My name, actually, is Sebastian. It's nice to see you awake again, lass. Are you thirsty at all?"

"Hmph." The young girl struggled to sit up and Sebastian laid a cautioning hand on her shoulder.

"Dinna be in a hurry, hmm? Let me help. Little sips, though." He adjusted the pillows carefully and soon had Macie better situated. When he offered her the tumbler of sweetened water, she sniffed it and then let it just touch her tongue, tasting warily before she took the smallest of sips.

Glancing around surreptitiously, she took in her surroundings. "Where's Roget?"

"He won't be troubling you again."

There was something unsettling and cool about her gaze. And pure disbelief in her voice. "You done for him? Really? You're no killer." Macie shifted uncomfortably.

"I've done my own share, Macie, but it was Aeryn who saw Roget dead." Understanding flashed in her bright gaze and she twitched again.

"Are you hurting, _a nighean_?"

From under dark brows the girl glared. "No. I need to use the pot."

"Oh. Well. I can help you or if you'll wait, I'll get Aeryn."

"I'm good. Just..."

"Sit up and stand. If you're okay, then I'll step out."

Macie was wobbly as a fawn, and disturbed by it, clearly used to being reasonably steady and graceful. But she was standing and Sebastian left her to it until he heard the rustling of the mattress that let him know his patient was back in bed. He stuck his head in, and besides being a little pale, she looked to be fine.

"There's a bit of soup, if you're hungry." The girl nodded but when she took the spoon, her hand shook so badly it slopped. "Never mind, let me."

"I'm good."

"Sure and you are. But it'll save the washing if you let me." Macie slurped at the spoonful Sebastian held for her, looking surprised that it tasted good. "Alright, then?"

"Looks like pond water."

"Aye, but Aeryn made it, so it tastes good. I think there was some mention of custard for you tomorrow. You'll have to save me a bit. She uses nutmeg and I'm partial."

She blinked at him, wary again even as she took another spoonful. "I'm...I don't have to stay. I got a place."

Sebastian nodded. Aeryn had warned him to assure Macie that she was free to leave as soon as Bethany said the girl was fit. He'd left the door open behind him when he came back in. "I imagine it's still there. Or, you could come wi' us."

"She said..."

"Well, that was before she got you into a bit of a spot now, wasn't it?"

Macie took another slurp at the broth. "He said he was gonna teach me. 'Cause legit jobs wasn't the right kind for someone like me, but I'd remember after he..." She veered away from the memory.

Holy Andraste, help me. Sebastian slowly set a hand on her shoulder and it twisted in his gut to see the way the girl's eyes snapped and watched it the whole time. She didn't flinch away though. "It won't happen again, Macie. I promise."

She clearly didn’t believe him and deflected the comfort. "You talk funny."

"I'm foreign." Sebastian didn't bother to hide the upward tip of his lips but for some reason his amusement made the dark brows on Macie's foxish little face draw in and down. Like some odd combination of Aeryn and Fenris, it dawned on him. That's what was so unsettling. Macie reminded him very much of the untrusting Aeryn Hawke who had first come to his Chantry so many years ago. The one he had lured into talking to him, one small word at a time before she'd finally relaxed enough to ask him to watch over her mother and sister.

"I don't need charity. I can do for myself." Sharp little chin in the air and Sebastian had to fight not to smirk at the resemblance now.

"I imagine if Aeryn's decided to let you come with, she's more than one job in mind for you once you're up and about. We're a busy crew."

The broth was gone, finally, and Macie blinked her narrow black eyes at him, blearily, looking suddenly exhausted.

"Tired, then?" The girl looked a little panicked. "It's alright, Macie. When I was sick for a bit, not long ago, I got tired fast, too. Lay back and sleep. I imagine the healer will be in to see you in a bit. And she'll have you up and about in no time."

"You gonna be around?"

"I'll stay if you'd like, _a nighean_."

Macie looked younger than she had before when she nodded, such a small movement that he almost didn't catch it. Scared and small and not as brave as she wanted Sebastian to think she was.

"Here I'll be, then."

>>>\------ >

The new cook Isabela had hired on showed up about halfway through Aeryn's supper preparations and she ended up giving the tall, brawny Fereldan named Gerte, a tour, making an inventory of ingredients and then sitting down with her going through menus and highlighting the things Aeryn's companions and the ship's crew were fondest of. And a reminder that there always had to be some main course besides fish, else Fenris would turn his nose up. Gerte seemed well capable, but Aeryn was reluctant to turn over her kitchen duties. She'd relied on the chores to fill her ship days with something besides waiting and relaxing. "I'll have a few things to be making up while we have a convalescent," Aeryn reminded the cook, who shrugged and told her to make herself free of the galley.

Aeryn peeked into Macie’s cabin, with another tray, loaded this time with soup and more bread, only to find the girl still asleep and Sebastian clearly meditating. But the broth was eaten, so Aeryn switched out the trays quietly, trying not to disturb either of them. She glanced toward Sebastian, though, when she felt his eyes on her.

“She woke for a bit. The soup was a hit.”

“Does she seem alright?”

“Aye. A little frightened and worried. She, ah…she wanted me to stay by her, while she slept.” Sebastian ducked his head, looking a little sheepish and Aeryn kissed the top of his head, fondly.

Can't blame the girl for that. “Oh? Well, I can’t imagine anyone I’d rather have watching over me, my love. Stay, if you’d like. Do you need anything?”

Sebastian considered for a moment and then nodded. “That book of tales I borrowed from Varric. I’ll read to her a bit if she wants, later. And perhaps my weapons kit. I can trim feathers while I sit.”

“I’ll drop them off on my way to the bath,” Aeryn assured him and hauled the tray up. His question stopped her before she reached the door.

“Aeryn, are you going to keep her?” He watched the uncertainty play across her face in the faint light of the brazier.

It was Aeryn’s turn to ponder. “Haven’t decided. I imagine we could find her a place in Denerim, if she wants to come away from Amaranthine. And I…” She shifted the tray in her arms before she asked, “Do _you_ want to? What can I teach her besides thieves’ tricks and knife play? You and Beth and Varric will be in charge of her education if she comes along. She’s likely past my basic teaching skills, besides some languages.”

Sebastian glanced down before fixing her with his blazing eyes. Aeryn noted it with a sinking feeling. Oh, this was important to him.

“I think…I think I’d like to have her along.” Holy Andraste, let her see. Macie needed someone. Why not them?

"Why?" Blue eyes searched her face and she realized he was hesitant to tell her. "Come on, love."

"She reminds me so of you...what I suppose you to have been like."

Really? Aeryn looked skeptically at Macie with her tanned skin and freckles and the shock of black hair and her pointy little features in a still childish face. "I suppose, maybe a bit around the chin?"

"No' that. Well, aye, that too. But the way she's quick and small and...and some of her mannerisms. She's fierce and guarded."

Oh.

"I wasn't like that. Not until... I could have been. I look at her and see what would have happened if..." she paused, knowing how Sebastian hated it when she defended her father, "if Father hadn't hidden so well. If he'd been discovered and I'd...I could have been Macie." Been a child thief and ended her life young on a gallows somewhere. Or...not. But Aeryn pushed aside that thought.

Sebastian nodded slowly. "Leandra told me once...that you were her lighthearted child." And recalling it did not help Sebastian find a reason to forgive Malcolm Hawke. He'd been responsible for the change.

Suddenly shy of his intense gaze, Aeryn slipped out of the door whispering that she needed to check on Beth. Sebastian watched her go with a sigh and readjusted Macie's pillows. A few minutes later, when he'd turned back to the door, his kit and his book were sitting by the door. Aeryn had come and gone as silently as one of her shadows. Sebastian resisted the urge to swear, loud and vocally, but it was a close thing.

 

Bethany was still dead to the world. She'd always been a deep sleeper, much to Aeryn's relief in past times. It had made it much easier to sneak around when the sisters had shared a room. Settling into the shadows, Aeryn watched Bethany sleep for a while. She hadn't the right really, any more. Too many years had passed since Aeryn had been the only line between Bethany and the horror-filled threat of imprisonment and Tranquility. Despite the tales their father had told her, despite everything Aeryn had been able to do, it was Bethany herself who had wiped out the line, crossed it like it meant nothing. And her little sister had done well enough, held her own in the Gallows. Even found love. Aeryn hadn't asked much about Cullen, fearing to bring up a sore subject. A little guilty in the face of her own romance. But Bethany seemed to be holding up. The hollows were gone from her cheeks, now, replaced by a soft, rosy flush, her walk in the Fade seemingly undisturbed and Aeryn twitched the blanket back into place over her sister's feet before padding out quietly. 

Aeryn hadn't found Varric and Fenris topside as she expected, since the rain had stopped. The two were in the captain’s cabin, heads bent over a game, instead.

"So, is your apprentice raring to go, yet?" Varric asked as Fenris slid over on his bench to allow her to sit down.

"She's not my apprentice, Varric. But she's doing well enough." Dropping down beside Fenris, Aeryn fiddled with his discarded cards and sniffed when the elf smacked her fingers. "If we keep her, could we not try to see if Macie might not find a more legal career than I managed?"

"There's nothing wrong with the storied and honored profession of thief and mercenary." Varric eyed her speculatively over his broad nose. "You know, if the whole Starkhaven thing doesn't work out, you could always try coming back here and taking over the Guild. Poor wretches, they'd be eating out of your hands in weeks."

Aeryn felt Fenris go a bit stiff next to her and glanced at her partner curiously before answering Varric. "You're a scoundrel, too, you know. Why not do it yourself?"

"Nah. Ferelden isn't my place and I know it. But you, Hawke? This is your home. You fit here, like you'd slid into a glove."

Hesitating, Fenris spoke. "He is not wrong, Hawke. I've seldom seen you so at ease in a place."

Cocking an eyebrow at him, Aeryn reminded her partner, "You've seen me in Kirkwall and in Orlais and on this bloody boat. I'd be hard pressed to think of less comfortable locations. I don't want to be a thief master." No. I don't. Not now.

"Queen of Thieves has quite a ring to it."

It did. And once upon a time...Aeryn glared at the dwarf, wondering why he was dredging up her childhood fantasies. "It also has a definite and short life span to go along with the glitzy title as we so recently proved. Anyway, it's a pointless thought. Sebastian is bound for Starkhaven."

Varric shrugged. "Yeah. But things...don't always go to plan."

"Well, we'd know all about that. It's not for me, Varric and even if it was...it's not just me, now, is it?" For Sebastian Vael was many things, ex-priest, master archer, and exiled prince, but he was never a Thief Master's consort. "You two should hit the hay. It's late."

Macie slept until Bethany came to check on her. The mage's gentle hands had woken the child but Macie had seemed to take to Bethany, so Sebastian took the chance to bathe and slip into bed. Aeryn was waiting for him in the cool dark and welcomed him to her with scarred, loving little hands and warm, scented kisses before they'd slept.

Sebastian had been so tired, he hadn't expected to dream, much less...

_Again. And again. And again. Until you learn, boy. Until you manage to make yourself into a Vael. Until you learn some control. You're a disgrace, boy. You will never be a prince of Starkhaven._

_And again, Geordie. Blast you. Give me the belt, if you can't make an impression on him._

_You worthless, heedless sneaking brat, you will learn if I have to take every piece of hide off those shoulders._

Aeryn woke to a large hand shoving against her shoulder, knocking her half out of the narrow bunk as Sebastian pushed away. He'd lost the blanket in the night, the linen sheet flung over her but it wrapped around his legs, leaving him lying on his back in the chilled cabin, sweating and whimpering. "Stop...please, Maker. _Stop_."

It wasn’t a strained back bothering him tonight, then. "Sebastian. Love, wake up." She reached for him as he shuddered.

"I'll be...I won't...For the love of Andraste, Father, please..." His voice sounded strange, strained and flat, without the usual brogue. Sebastian arched away from her hand, trying to twist away from what was happening in his head.

Oh, a dream of _that_. Aeryn sat up and stroked her fingers into his rough, sweat-dampened hair. "It's over. Sebastian, love. I'm here. He's not. I've got you. I won't let go. Shh. Sebastian, my love, you're alright. It's over long ago." She grabbed the woolen blanket up to lay across his cool body knowing he was always more likely to dream poorly when he was cold.

"Make him stop." He pleaded in that curiously formal accent, so unlike his warm lilt, and useless rage welled up in her again. Bastard. Maker forsaken evil wretch. She'd have sent Simeon Vael to the Void, herself, and done it with a smile.

"I would. Sebastian, I would. I would have made him stop, my own. I wish I could have. Come here." Aeryn tugged his lean body over off of the old scars, and with a moan so close to a sob he huddled against her, wrapped his arms around her waist, clinging as if he'd been drowning, ruddy head buried in her lap and his shoulders shaking. "Shh. I've got you. I love you. I won't let go." Curling close around him, Aeryn laid kisses to his temple and set to rubbing away the gooseflesh across his skin until he warmed under her hands. Sebastian didn't truly wake, but relaxed finally under her touch, seemed to slip into easier sleep.

Aeryn sat with him, staring into the dark, holding Sebastian safe, tracing her hands over his shoulders, feeling his heartbeat beneath her fingertips and turning over black-hearted thoughts like rocks until the gilt edge of dawn showed through the porthole.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Author’s Note: A million thanks to everyone who has favorited and followed and reviewed. Hope you all continue to enjoy. Special thanks to mille libri, who corrals my wild commas and prevents me from making up words. All mistakes are my own._
> 
>  
> 
> _Bioware owns all, I’m just happy to play in the sandbox._

Sebastian woke with his head pillowed nicely upon Aeryn's white thighs and a taste of musty cotton in his mouth as though he'd been drinking with Fenris. The cabin was starting to lighten, throwing the rough wooden boards that made walls and decks into sharp relief and bringing the noisome scent of fish and salt into the air on the chilly damp breeze through the porthole. The boat rocked a bit as another ship passed, the calls of its crew to the mates of the _Siren_ as jocular as the cry of gulls in the air.

Tipping his head just to the side, Sebastian could look up to her face, the arching red brows drawn down and the lush mouth set firmly lent a particularly stern look to Aeryn’s sweet features, even as she slept.

It was a breathtaking view, just under the curve of her plump breast and with her nipples limned in morning light. But how had he gotten here, again? Sebastian swallowed noting the tightness in his throat and then the way his arms were still around her waist and scraps of his dream settled back over him.

Oh. Well. He could dwell on it, he supposed. Or he could embrace the glory the Maker had set before him, instead. Pushing aside the vapor of old pain Sebastian lifted his head and pressed his lips to the warm fullness just within reach.

Aeryn felt the caress and snapped open her eyes.

Sebastian caught his breath at the lingering blackness in the pale gray depths. "Maker. You're the fiercest wee thing."

Blinking at the tone of his voice, Aeryn nodded. "If I have cause to be." Looking him over carefully, she saw that Sebastian's eyes were clear and his expression open, the corners of his lips turned up just a little mischievously. Clearly, he was inclined to ignore his nightmare. But she felt compelled to ask, smoothing back a strand of his russet hair, "How are you this morning, my love?"

He reached a hand up to her cheek and she nuzzled into his palm. "Better rested than you, _à ruin_." His rich brogue was back, and Aeryn closed her eyes again, just a moment, to enjoy the sound.

"No matter." And how often had she woken him in the night? Aeryn tightened slim fingers in his tousled hair and leaned over to kiss him, letting her tongue linger along the full sweep of his lower lip. Morning breath not withstanding, it was sweet.

"Hmm. Might be worth th' dream to wake this way ever' morning." Sebastian let his fingers dwell against the dimples low on her back as he traced the slope of her breast with gentle lips.

Chuckling, she rubbed a rough thumb along his cheekbone. "You don't need to wheedle kisses, Sebastian. Are you...I haven't known you to have nightmares that bad in a while."

"No. I havena dreamed of...of my father in years. Since before I joined you. I think perhaps it was just th' situation."

"With Macie?"

"And my venturing into the whorehouse. Somehow I managed to miss the times you went to th' Rose." Sebastian saw a trace of distress flit across her face and he sat up and pulled her to him. "No, now. I meant what I said. I am not upset at all, at all by helping you there. I did my duty. Do you mean to hold yourself responsible for what my foolish mind dredges up in my sleep? For I can do the same and blame myself every time you dream poorly, Aeryn."

He would, too, she knew. "Alright. Tell me true, though, my own. You told me it was just the once that he was the one who hurt you." And the possessive little growl in her husky voice curled up warmly against Sebastian's heart, made him smile, just a little pleased at her vehemence. Which he would have to remember to confess, next time he was given the chance.

 

"It was. But, now and again it was rougher than it could have been. And it was because he insisted upon it and stood by to watch that it was done. But all those times, he had a healer attend me later. After I'd suffered a bit." It made him glad now, that he could talk about it freely with her. It had taken him years before he could regard what had occurred between his father and himself with any sense of detachment. Only in confession had he ever spoken. "It doesna matter, _mo chridhe_. Let it go back to the Fade where it belongs."

Her arms snaked around his neck. "It matters to me, beloved. I can't...I wish..." But what could she tell him? That she'd spent the waning night considering inventive ways to avenge Sebastian's hurts on those who were long since dust and ashes? When plainly, it was his wish to move on and forgive? So, instead, Aeryn set her mouth to the hollow of his throat and suckled hungrily at the salt on his golden skin.

"Ah." The warmth of her mouth made Sebastian breathe in sharply and he skirted his hands up to rest on either side of her face and tipped it up to gaze into her eyes before claiming her lips. Aeryn had been going to say something, he knew and he meant to ask right up to the moment when her clever fingers brushed his cock and gripped the morning's evidence of his desire in her firm grasp. He did _try_. "Aeryn..."

"Hmm?" Aeryn slid down his body, licking and tasting along the lean torso, before kissing the broad tip of his aroused head and sliding the flat of her tongue down the suddenly fully rigid length. She chuckled as he gasped out her name again. The scent of Sebastian, dark and musky, just a hint of crisp fir, wreathed around her and Aeryn hummed contentedly as she took his cock fully into her mouth.

Falling back against the pillows, Sebastian let his hands run into the silk of her hair and let his mind go blank of everything but the feel of her, the glide of her tongue, the brush of her fingers, and the gentle sucking draw into blessed slick heat.

This, at least, Aeryn could do and ardently. Lay pleasure and love over whatever memories might linger. He loved to be touched. Craved her hands on him, even innocently, and she wondered sometimes, how Sebastian had borne it, so many years with only scraps of touch. A blessing here, a kiss of peace there. No matter. Her privilege to rectify that injustice, her blessing to be able to do that which she had longed to for so many years and indulge him. One hand kept up the stroking rhythm for a moment while Aeryn nuzzled and nipped across his tanned, ridged stomach and laved against the paler thin skin and sharp bone of his hip, the other hand roving; deft fingers twining in rough fur, fondling his sac, exploring the creases of his thighs and the curve of his arse as Sebastian moaned and quaked beneath her increasingly explicit caresses.

Pressing his cock between the soft plumpness of her breasts, Aeryn murmured, low and encouraging as he thrust. Sebastian opened his eyes to see her watching his reactions with rapt attention and eyes a blend of smoke and silver. Her lips were swollen and shone dark pink in the morning light and he couldn't for the life of him help the "Holy Maker" that escaped him as his head dropped back.

Ah, she did love it when she could make her Sebastian blaspheme. It was, no doubt, a terrible blot on her character. Aeryn laughed throatily and dipped her tongue into his navel.

Sebastian arched into her hands as the inevitable end gathered under his tight skin and flooded him with need. "Please, Aeryn. _Leannan_ , my lovely, sweet, ah..." Her lush lips closed around his aching length again with a swirl of tongue and his fingers tightened convulsively against her skull as she swallowed and drew him unresisting into the white rushing tide of climax.

Aeryn rubbed a cheek against the light hair sprinkling his long, firm thigh as Sebastian recovered for a moment. A light scratching knock sounded on the door. "Aeryn?"

"Yes, Bethany?" Her voice was just a little hoarse and Aeryn felt long fingers caressing her throat, soothingly.

"Macie's awake. She'd like to talk with you, if you're...er...amenable." Hmm. And how long had her sister been lingering at the door?

"I'll be along as soon as I'm dressed."

"Alright. She's...she's getting a bit skittish."

Aeryn assured her, "Won't be a moment." Sebastian, however, looked like he'd rather curl up and go back to sleep. Patting his chest, she rolled out of the low bunk. He stretched out a long arm and caught her by the waist. Well, perhaps not sleep, then.

"Maybe one moment?" Sebastian purred against the soft hair that curled a little behind her ear and his other hand ran the length of her spine and over her thigh to trace the inked dagger high inside.

"No." A hard palm skated up to her breast, the nipple pearled up under calloused fingers. "Later," she amended and wriggled from his hold, shooting him a fondly reluctant look. "If Macie's really skittish, then it's too much of a risk that she'll try to leave."

Sebastian's hooded gaze followed her from the bed as Aeryn hastily took care of her morning ablutions; a quick chilly wash from the pitcher, cleaning her teeth and rubbing her cream into her pale skin before running a brush through the dark red hair and applying a bit of color to her bruised lips. Ever efficient, she was dressed and ready before he was particularly ready for her to be.

"She'll want to see you, too, I expect."

"Hmph." But he got to his feet and stretched, his hands pressed up against the ceiling, and Aeryn leaned against the doorframe and took a moment to enjoy the play of light along his naked, tall, beautifully muscular body, growing light catching in the hair along his limbs. Sebastian caught her watching and started to prowl towards her, intent in his movement and a wicked smile on his beautiful mouth.

Right. Going. Now. She grabbed a small sack up from the deck and ducked out of the door with a teasing smile, just as he reached for her.

Macie was sitting up, her black hair askew and her face still a little pale under her the yellowing bruises on her tanned skin, but alert and bright eyed. Bethany had borrowed a light green tunic from Merrill for Macie to wear, the narrowly built elf a better fit than any of the rest of them, though the color didn’t do the girl any favors. Aeryn would have to cut some things of her own down for the girl. Merrill didn’t have that many tunics to spare. 

Macie looked, however, just a bit pouty when it was Aeryn who showed and not Sebastian and Aeryn gave her a crooked smirk. "Yeah. I'd rather have him, as well, he'll be along in a moment. But, how do you feel?"

"Fine. Can I go?"

"Anytime. I'll get you some clothes. Your other things were pretty ragged. Or you could come with us, to Denerim at least."

"What's in Denerim?" The girl looked interested despite herself.

"Oh, the palace and a huge market. A good sized port. Lots of nobles with fat purses. Plenty of action, I'd imagine."

"But I can stay here in Amaranthine?"

Aeryn settled into the chair. "You could. But, Macie, I killed Roget. There's likely to be some kick-back from that and it's possible it'll land on you, since we're leaving pretty soon. You have any real reason to stay? Family? Friends that need you?"

The girl ducked that particular question and asked one of her own. "How'd he die?"

Aeryn considered her for a moment. "You mean how did I kill him or did he die well?"

"I mean how did you do him? You're just a sharper and he's a mean son of a bitch."

Just a sharper. No, not really, but, Macie didn't need to know that just yet. "I cut his throat and he bled out fast because of the poison I used."

"Did it hurt?" Sebastian was in the doorway, now, and listening but Macie's eyes were on the woman seated next to her.

Aeryn shrugged. "No idea. I imagine it wasn't the most pleasant thing. He didn't hurt as much as I could have made him, if that's what you're asking." Sebastian gave a displeased grunt and Aeryn flicked her eyes to him, cautioningly. "I could have made it worse. But I don't work that way. Quick and done and it's over. He didn't put up much of a fight, really."

"Oh." Aeryn caught a look of hurt and bewilderment on the girl's face and realized her mistake in being casual about how easily Roget had gone down. It was clear, to Aeryn, anyway, that the girl thought she should have been able to defend herself better.

"Hey. No, look. Macie, I kill people. I do it a lot. And I'm very good at it." Her voice was grave and there was no boasting in the statement, just level truth. "No one expected you to be able to keep a grown man from hurting you, especially since you were working for him. I went in with backup and I...Macie, you called me a sharper. But that's not exactly what I am, alright?"

The dark eyes searched her face, took in Aeryn's upright posture and the earnest way she spoke. "Yeah. I guess."

"So. Do you want to come with us or not?" Sharp and to the point and Sebastian wondered if perhaps Aeryn was being a bit too abrupt. It seemed to him that Macie still felt hunted. 

Before Sebastian could say anything, Fenris came up behind him and cleared his throat, drawing Aeryn's attention. "Hawke. Isabela's deckhands just came back. There are rumors that Bann Corin is not quite satisfied with Captain Aiden's report. The Bann's men are looking around for information on Roget's last whereabouts."

"Who are they looking for?" Sebastian would be the one they'd be after.

Fenris smirked up at Sebastian. "A short, dark, bearded man from Antiva is apparently what the whores have been saying."

"Oh, you charmer. You must have made an impression." Aeryn shot Sebastian a grin and he shrugged with a slightly embarrassed smile. Likely it was the coin he'd spread about that had gained him a bit of loyalty.

Turning grave green eyes on Macie, Fenris added, "But they are also looking for our guest." This was said grimly and Aeryn sighed.

"Ah. Well, that changes things." Aeryn looked back to the girl who was huddled up in the blanket. "No one's going to touch you, pup. I promise. But, you do need to come with us, now. You're free to go as soon as you can be safe." Macie’s black eyes were narrowed and suspicious, but there was a slight tremor in her thin frame.

"It will be well, Macie." Sebastian promised quietly and, after a moment, the girl nodded slowly.

Aeryn patted the girl’s leg under the grey striped woolen blanket. "Do you have a stash somewhere? I can go collect it for you before we cast off."

"Nah. Anything I had is long gone by now." Macie cut her eyes, though, and Aeryn realized the girl was hoping to return and pick up her treasures. But if Macie didn't trust Aeryn, it couldn't be forced.

"Alright." Aeryn sat the small sack she’d brought in Macie's lap. "This'll get you started over, then. I'd hoped to pick you up a chest to store it in, but it'll have to wait, now. Fenris, go tell Isabela we can go whenever she's got the tide, yeah?"

"Of course."

Macie had opened the sack and pulled out the small aurum dagger. It gleamed with care, a surprisingly simple design, with only a small ruby on the butt and an engraved vine along the curved hilt to make it stand out. "This was Roget's." She looked at it like it might bite her, the wicked thing was far too large for her hand.

"I know. All of that was on him. I figured he owed you a bit of reparation."

Macie upended the sack, letting the few trinkets and gold and silver spill out to gleam dully on the woven coverlet. "This is...I don't want this." Macie handed the dagger back to Aeryn, blade first. 

Aeryn clasped the girl's skinny wrist and reached carefully around, to take the hilt. Clearly, Macie didn't have a lot of training with daggers. That would have to change. "You can sell it off in Denerim. There are plenty of merchants who can get rid of it and you can have the coin or we can pick you up something else." One hesitant finger was poking through the coins.

"This is a lot. I can pay my way." Macie held out one sovereign to Aeryn who took it and rolled it over the back of her knuckles, drawing Macie’s wary attention. Sebastian was reminded that Perri had a similar habit. He’d have to mention it to Aeryn.

Aeryn palmed the gold coin. "I'll take this, Macie. But you'll have it back once you're up and about and Bethany says you can earn your keep. The Captain of this ship always needs an extra hand and once we're back on land, I'll have a thing or two for you to do. But if you work for me, pup, it means you'll do what you're told." 

Macie hunched up and Aeryn hummed, low and soothing. "No. I won't beat you. But I don't need a child hanging around, either. I _might_ need an apprentice. It's up to you to help me decide. Otherwise, I'll set you up at the first Chantry we get to and we'll be done. Being my apprentice, though, means you'll learn what I want you to. You'll have lessons and exercises and it won't all be popping locks and swiping. Deal?"

"If'n I get caught..."

"You won't be doing anything to get caught at for a while, Macie."

Rebellion crossed over the girl's face and Aeryn swallowed a bit of relief to see it. If Macie’s spirit was broken, it would be a harder road to help her. And Aeryn had little illusion about her own patience with a clingy, damaged child. This was going to be a tricky thing. 

Aeryn had a sudden flush of longing for her mother. It had been Leandra who had taken Orana under her wing when Aeryn had just had the little elf make her way to Kirkwall. Mother had done the hard part. Aeryn had just provided the safe place. _Hope Sebastian knows what we’re in for_ , she thought ruefully. So much easier to just dump the kid off at the Chantry, put in a bit of coin for her keep and move on. But Aeryn knew exactly what Sebastian would think of that and a little shame welled up. 

"Yeah, but _if_ I get caught..."

"Then, if you lose your hand, I'll pay your way the rest of my life and leave you a stipend when I swing, myself."

"Aeryn..." He was a little surprised at the smirk she sent him. 

"Not that it's likely to happen, Sebastian. Standard practice."

He noted that this bit of detail seemed to reassure Macie, anyway. She had the first hint of a smile on her face he'd seen.

The rude noise of a growling stomach sparked Aeryn's grin and she patted Macie's hand. "That I can take care of now. I'll bring you a bit of bread and broth and if you keep it down, I've got a treat."

Macie pointed at Sebastian. "That 'un said he'd nab my custard if you made it."

"Did he? Hmm. Sebastian does have quick hands. I'll make extra, Macie. Can't have my poor archer going hungry, either." Aeryn stood and slipped past him, brushing his cheek with a kiss as she left. 

“Well, Macie. How about a bit of a story while you wait for your breakfast, then?” Sebastian held up Varric’s book of rogue’s tales and leafed through to find one a little easier to edit for a young girl. 

 

The tide rose within the hour and Isabela cast them off from the dock and made for open water. Once they were away from traffic, Bethany allowed Macie to come up to the deck for some air and sunlight. The girl was soon enthralled in watching Isabela work the wheel and bark orders and in watching the crew climb the rigging like spiders and make the countless adjustments of a new journey. Aeryn took the chance to sidle up to her sister and make a request.

"Beth, I need a bit of help with some of my herbs, if you've got the time."

"I can do up your sun cream anytime, Aeryn, just put the stuff in my cabin."

"Ah. No, not just that." Void. You're a grown woman, stop dallying. "I need some of that women's tea made up, too. Anders used to, but..."

Bethany blinked. "Oh. Oh! Of course. But you know, I won't until I give you an exam, right?"

Aeryn popped her neck and grumbled, "Really? I got a good bill of health not two days ago from Dernal. Just..."

"Father's rules." Bethany was unusually stern and Aeryn supposed she'd learned authority from dealing with her apprentices in the Gallows. Father had told Aeryn he'd give her the tea when she was brave enough to come and ask him openly and make no issue about the exam. She imagined he had hoped it would slow her down. Apparently, Father had passed that tidbit onto Bethany.

"Fine," she huffed, blowing her bangs exasperatedly out of her face, and Bethany shook her had, softly amused at her sister's reluctance.

"Go on downstairs and I'll be there in a minute."

"Below decks, not downstairs."

"Whatever."

Aeryn waved at Sebastian, who was helping to reorganize the crates above deck, and indicated he was in charge of Macie for a while. He raised his hand in acknowledgment and she went down to get her basket of herbs.

Beth's cabin was on the shaded forward portside of the ship, cool and dim. The scent of herbs and the coppery smell of magic lingered in the air. It reminded Aeryn of her father's stillroom and she swallowed hard at the sudden flash of memory as she sat on Bethany's small bunk, neatly made to their mother’s taut standard.

Beth was an efficient healer, anyway, and Aeryn was lacing herself back up in no time. Her sister was rummaging through the basket and pulling out the ingredients she needed from the jumbled mix of packages. "Eventually, you have to stop taking this, you know."

Bethany saw Aeryn go just a bit still before she looked up from her ties. "Is that so?"

"Sister...you know...he needs heirs."

"Yes. Is it possible for us to actually win Sebastian’s throne before people, especially my little sister, start treating me like a prize ewe and checking my udders?" 

Bethany clucked. "You're the one who fell in love with a prince. It is, I believe, part of the package. And...your nameday is...."

"Oh, Maker, _really_?"

Bethany firmed up her chin. She was acting as Aeryn's healer now...which terrified her, especially when Sebastian checked her work with critical eyes every time she cast the least healing spell on Aeryn. Gentle a soul as he was, Bethany sometimes doubted what would happen if she failed to keep Aeryn hale. But, healing carried other responsibilities. "I'm just reminding you, you won't be young forever. Pregnancies are easier on younger women, usually. There's less risk."

She saw Aeryn's eyes go steely and did her best not to show anything but determination in the face of her sister’s sudden turn. "Do _not_ say that in front of Sebastian, Bethany Hawke. Do you hear me? Not _ever_. He worries enough about me as it is."

"I wouldn't, Aeryn. I promise." She didn't allow herself to sound cowed, though. "You're healthy and strong, there's no reason you couldn't have a half dozen successful pregnancies well up into your fourth decade." Her older sister’s creamy complexion went a little paler at that idea. "But, time..."

Pressing her lips together, Aeryn nodded. "Alright, I get it. But what do you...I can't fight pregnant, Beth. We're about to start a war. I'm no mage nor even an archer, my work requires up close and personal contact and even _I'm_ not reckless enough to risk..."

"No, I know. Just...it will take some time, two or three months for the effects of these herbs to leach out of your blood once you stop, as long as you've taken them."

"After we're married, I'll stop."

Bethany couldn't help her curiosity. "When do you..."

Aeryn cut her off, casually shrugging. "Oh, probably after his coronation. I expect there are official things to be done before a prince can ask."

Shock lanced like lightning through the mage. "He hasn't _asked_?"

"Of course not. He's set on giving me a proper prince, can't do that if we've never even set foot in Starkhaven."

"But...Aeryn...he hasn't even...?" Bethany tried to work her head around it. Sebastian loved Aeryn. There wasn't any doubt of that, but why wasn't it official yet?

"We've discussed it. Well, around it. Sebastian's being practical, for once." Bethany looked nonplussed and Aeryn rolled her eyes. "Bethany, stop. I'm not worried. If I was, I'd have asked _him_. He loves me. I know what he wants of our future. He'll ask when it's right. First things first." Aeryn fixed her sister with a warning gleam. "And, little sister, you are _not_ to pester him. Do not bring it up."

"I..." Aeryn pointed a threatening finger at Bethany and the mage subsided. "All right. But don't make me remind you of what Mother used to say about cows and free milk."

"And don't make me remind you that _I_ was a seven-months babe."

" _Aeryn_. Oh, Holy Maker, that's just unnecessary." And so they were laughing when they went back above.

>>>\----- >

Isabela would tell Aeryn later that she'd been surprised that they hadn't run into heavy storms before, on this late autumn voyage. Well, actually, Isabela had said, “Well, sweet thing. We pushed our fucking luck till it smashed us in the face,” but it translated. 

The _Siren's Call II_ had taken the light rain storms they ran in and out of in stride. But the ominous purple and green sky that hung on the horizon, stretching to either side of the view, was not to be taken lightly. The very air seemed to grow denser as they approached and Aeryn could smell the burnt copper of electricity starting to build.

"Could we run into port and just ride it out?" Aeryn asked nervously as they stowed all the loose gear below decks. She'd been through a rough storm on her trip to Kirkwall and had no interest in repeating it.

The Captain shook her head. "No time to find a sheltered cove. Siren would smash herself against the coast before I could get her back out into open water. Don't you mind it, sweet thing. Isabela will get you safe and sound to Denerim. My girl has heart."

The water grew choppy and first Macie and then, to his everlasting shame, Fenris turned green and sick and Bethany was kept running between them, with Sebastian drafted as a nurse. The rain hit the ship in pelting, razor sharp, almost frozen drops and Isabela hustled them all below decks. "I've got no fucking time to worry that you've been swept overboard. Stay down there!" And she slammed the hatch, shutting them in the dark. Candles were too dangerous just at the moment.

The ship ran up and down the waves, taking each in its turn. Now and again, the companions heard the thump of something hitting or feet running up the deck.

Only Isabela's cabin was large enough for all of them to gather in, but the windows in the stern made it dangerous, they realized, when a large log crashed against the glazing on the heaving down side of a large wave. She left Varric to tend to a slightly hysterical Merrill, for which she got a truly dirty look, but the wind howled around the ship as she paced her cabin. 

She stepped in to see Fenris while Bethany and Sebastian were busy with Macie and received a growled Arcanum curse and a weakly thrown, thankfully empty, slop bucket.

The ship creaked ominously around her and Aeryn couldn't stand it a moment longer. Too sodding dark and closed in. And too hard to figure out what was going on.

Sebastian only realized Aeryn had disappeared when he checked into the main cabin for a new tunic for Fenris.

Holy Beloved. Surely she hadn't...

He wasn't going to shake her, he was going to _tie_ her to their blighted bed. 

Careening down the passageway to the hatch, Sebastian went to fling it open only to yell in startled surprise when Aeryn yanked the hatch out of his hands from above. "Get Beth! One of the hands just broke his leg."

When Sebastian brought her up to the swamped deck, Bethany set to work on the sailor, whose leg was not only broken in two places, but wrenched out of socket, as well. 

As the mage worked to stabilize the man enough to bring him below, Sebastian was staring uncomprehending at Aeryn who was stripped down to her sleeveless tunic and breeches and lashing a rope around her waist and shoulders in the driving rain. "What in the Maker's name are you doing?" 

"Billy was over the side fixing a hole. I've got to..." She jerked her thumb over the side as if that explained anything at all in any sort of rational manner. 

Maker help me. Surely not. " _You've _got to do _what_?"__

__"Fix it." She waved her hand at the sacking holding a tar pot and a board, a hammer, and a bit of canvas that was waiting._ _

__"Why?"_ _

__"Did I mention the hole?" Aeryn sent him her mocking smile from beneath sodden crimson bangs and her dimple flashed beguilingly._ _

__Sebastian grasped his own drenched hair with both hands to keep from grabbing her shoulders and setting her teeth to rattling. "Why _you_ , Aeryn?" he gritted out as chilling salt spray lashed over them. He hadn’t thought he could get any wetter, but apparently he'd been sadly wrong._ _

__"Have you noticed they're a bit busy? Apparently, Bela’s spare hand isn’t much of a swimmer. And I'm not sending one of those little cabin boys into that." She indicated the green and black water slapping over the side with another careless wave._ _

__Tugging the final knot tight, Aeryn grabbed up her sack, tucking it into a belt pouch and adjusted the boards lashed over her shoulder. "Kiss me quick and..."_ _

__"No! Let me, I'll go." Desperate, he caught her wrist to keep her from going over the rail._ _

__"Sebastian..." Aeryn pulled away but he snagged the rope and held it. He was soaked and half frozen, but when the lightning lit the air around them, she was grinning with manic delight. The wildness of the storm had clearly called up the chaotic streak in her soul._ _

__Isabela swayed up behind him, looking understandably haggard. "No luck, Choir Boy. Got to be her. I can’t spare Japeth or Darin on the rigging and Mikel’s useless in a mess like that. Without Fenris, we can't haul your delicious arse back over if you get knocked out, Merrill's not strong enough, and Varric can't swim for shit, either."_ _

__"Please, Aeryn." Sebastian pleaded but she only stretched up to kiss him, her lips cold and wet against his, but the breath of her warm as life, just for a second. But before he could snatch her back again, Aeryn had pulled away and grabbed the railing._ _

__"I'll be careful as I can, my love. Don't hold that rope without your gloves." And Aeryn vaulted over the rail with a laugh and a wink, disappearing in the blowing rain and foam whipped waves. Sebastian had to let go of the running rope before it burned his hands._ _

__Isabela gave him a remarkably sympathetic look and patted his backside as he pulled his gloves out of his pouch, quickly. "You knew she was crazy when you slept with her, pretty boy. I'll send Varric to give you a hand." The pirate gave him a final comforting squeeze and went to head off another minor catastrophe._ _

__That had not just happened. It was some sort of …nightmare. But Sebastian blinked and spit out salt when another splashing wave caught him with his mouth open. "Holy Maker, please watch over your child who has misplaced any good sense you graced her with and whom I will be chaining to the bed as soon as she comes back, please Maker, let her come back. Holy Andraste, Beloved of the Maker..."_ _

__

___Well_ , thought Aeryn as the waves closed over her head, _I have probably done less stupid things. Sodding Void_._ _

__She found the hole relatively easily and only slopped herself with hot tar twice before she got the canvas stuck in place._ _

__The ship heaved underneath her and she was forced to push away, losing the rune-heated pot and the brush in her hand, which Bela would probably charge her for. It took five minutes of determined swimming to get back to the side. Fortunately, the board had remained strapped in place across her back and the hammer and the cut nails were still in her pouch._ _

__The icy seawater seemed to be seeping into Aeryn's bones and her teeth were chattering when she finally got the board nailed in securely over the waterproofed canvas. She was shaking so hard that it was almost impossible to get her frozen hands to close around the rope to haul herself back up._ _

__And when another wave smashed her against the ship-lapped planking and knocked the air out of her, it occurred to her that perhaps she should have just walked to blighted Denerim. And maybe Bethany was right and it was possible to be too wet and too cold._ _

__Varric was swearing creatively as Sebastian prayed, which was far less distracting than it would have been in more ideal settings, he thought. In front of the roaring fire in Aeryn's library, say. With one of Orana's rabbit pies, a stack of Aeryn's raspberry tarts, a bottle of whisky, and Aeryn getting pleasantly tipsy, sticky, and sweet while she fed him._ _

__Maker. Sebastian shook himself. The cold was getting to him. And it had been too long since he'd gotten a glimpse of her red hair through the storm-churned water. "Varric! Let's haul her up."_ _

__The dwarf nodded with a worried hmph. "Yeah. It's been too long."_ _

__Three minutes of determined pulling and Sebastian noted nervously that the hempen rope was stretching and fraying. "Faster, man." His prayers reduced to only _please, please, please_._ _

__"Rivaini!" Varric bellowed over the force of the storm and Isabela and brawny Mikel appeared to add their assistance._ _

__When Aeryn's head appeared over the railing, her normally pale skin was almost blue like veined marble, her lips were white and there was a nasty scrape along the side of her face. Sebastian felt his heart give a leaden thud when her eyes fluttered open. _Maker, thank you_. He wrapped his cold-stiffened hands around her arms and hauled her home. He had to pry her fingers from around the rope while Varric cut her free._ _

__“Andraste’s tits, Hawke. You are the luckiest little idiot I’ve ever met.” Sebastian let Varric scold her, not trusting himself to not say something he’d regret._ _

__"I...I...I...sw...swear....I'll....nnnnever ....ddoo...thattt agggainn." Aeryn shakily assured Sebastian as he set her into Isabela's rune-heated bath. The water slopped out as the boat continued to be lashed by the waves, but he pumped more in, hoping the exercise would warm him up, too. He’d recalled Anders telling them once when Merrill had gotten herself lost on the walls of Kirkwall in the dead of winter that hot water was a better way to warm someone than just blankets. And if Sebastian hated being beholden to the abomination in any way, he couldn’t deny that the mage had once been a brilliant healer._ _

__"Well, and you're right about _that_." Sebastian grumbled as he stripped Aeryn’s sodden tunic and cut the salt water swollen laces on her trousers with his belt knife. At least she hadn't worn leather. He managed to pull the cloth off of her. Merrill brought them tea and Sebastian laced Aeryn's cup liberally with honey and whisky before holding it for her to sip and gulping at his own in the other hand. The elf draped a wool blanket over his shoulders and set another one close by for Aeryn. _ _

__A horrid creaking sound shuddered through the ship, which lurched under them wildly. Most of the bath water splashed onto the floor, their tea spilled and, Aeryn’s eyes, which had been half-closed, went wide in fright. “The mast…”_ _

__Maker…”Merrill, can you run those vines of yours up th’ main mast? Would it hold?”_ _

__“Oh! I…don’t know, but…” She dashed out of the cabin, clearly on a mission to find out._ _

__Sebastian and Aeryn listened apprehensively, but no further sounds of breaking wood came. Isabela’s salt-roughed voice shouted over the wail of the storm but neither of them could decipher the words. “Get me out of here.” Aeryn tried to pull herself out of the bath, but another wrenching movement of the ship sent her sprawling and she smacked her head against the wooden edge. “Oww. Void.”_ _

__“Oh. Aeryn, Maker, I’m sorry.”_ _

__“Not your fault.” Sebastian wrapped the blanket around her and they wove their way to the door and into their own cabin. He settled Aeryn on the bed, piling the quilts back on her._ _

__“I’ll be right back, _leannan_. Dinna move.” And, heeding the grim, taut note in his ragged voice, Aeryn laid back and closed her eyes, still feeling the creeping, dragging strength of the wild water and shoving down just how afraid she’d been until she’d felt Sebastian’s hands on her._ _

__Sebastian came back with the cups and the teapot. Thinking Aeryn to be asleep, he moved quietly, pulling off his own wet things and changing into dry clothes. Another rolling movement of the ship had him bracing himself against the ceiling and wall and grimacing as his stomach lurched the other way. Much more of this and he'd be as sick as Fenris. But Aeryn’s cold hand snagged his when he went to check her forehead for any incipient fever._ _

__"Come lay with me." There was something worrying in her salt reddened eyes and Sebastian slid in next to her and gathered her up._ _

__"You scared th' life out of me, _mo chridhe_." He laced his fingers together, locking her safely against him, and pressed a kiss to her temple._ _

__"Rather thought I'd screwed up, myself." She confessed._ _

__"And why were you topside at all?" Aeryn didn't answer and he asked again, "Aeryn?"_ _

__"Oh, you know. Can't stand not to be part of the action." But a shudder ran through her as another wave crashed into the side of the ship and slim fingers curled into his tunic, almost clutching, and Sebastian frowned. She was holding back something._ _

__"And the real reason," he prodded._ _

__Aeryn didn't really want to tell him. He'd coddle her and worry over her and it honestly wasn't anything she fussed about, normally. Sebastian tipped her chin up, forcing her to meet his eyes. She blinked owlishly against a flash of lightning and shrugged._ _

__Sebastian didn't fool himself that Aeryn couldn't lie to him, with her eyes on his and innocence written on her face. But he could hope that it _might_ be harder when he was gazing straight at her, doing his best version of patient Brother. "Out with it, now."_ _

__His eyes were steady on hers, drawing her in like a comforting fire, coaxing a confession. Fine. Though, really, she thought, it was pathetic how hard it was for her to put him off these days._ _

__Aeryn fought to keep her voice casual. "I just...I don't like being shut in, is all. Fenris was sick, you were busy, Varric had his hands full with Merrill. I just wanted something to do." Closing her eyes, she turned her face into his shoulder and breathed in, settling the jangle of her nerves with the safe, familiar scent of the fir soap Sebastian favored._ _

__She'd needed a distraction, he realized. And as all of Aeryn’s usual suspects had been otherwise occupied, she'd leapt at the chance to be useful above decks, rather than remain stuck below. How long, Sebastian wondered. How long had she been afraid of being locked in the dark? The boat to Kirkwall? The Deep Roads? And did anyone else know?_ _

__He started to ask and Aeryn cut him off, briskly and firmly. "Don't. It's not a big deal and I'm _fine_. Just…stay with me for a bit, hmm?"_ _

__It was the rigid line of her spine that snapped Sebastian's mouth shut. He didn't want to take the chance she'd pull away or hide from him after an admission like that and instead held her close and safe and whispered his thanks as she relaxed against him, again._ _

__

__> >>\----- >_ _

The storm blew itself out over the next few hours. Merrill’s vines did hold the splintering mainsail mast on level long enough for the crew to make some temporary repairs.

Sebastian hadn’t actually chained Aeryn to their bunk, though he did consider it. She stayed in bed with a bone-shaking chill and he hovered over her for the next day, plying her with whisky and tea and the potions that Bethany was able to brew up once the ship had come to an even keel, again. Sebastian admitted to fussing, until Aeryn had just linked her foot behind his knee, toppled him into bed with her and reminded him of a simpler way to warm up. 

__Fenris growled out his opinion of her little swim and Aeryn had sat as contritely as any penitent, taking her partner’s scolding with good grace._ _

__But after a day or so, as they limped to Denerim and her companions continued to lecture her on her recklessness, Aeryn had lifted an imperious eyebrow at them all and given a cool little smile. “Next time, I’ll just let the boat fill with water and we’ll pleasantly and safely drown together, of course.”_ _

__And that had been the end of that._ _

__A day’s sail out of the capital, Sebastian took his armor topside to take in the last of the pleasant autumn sun and to give his armor a polish, in anticipation of going to court._ _

__He found Aeryn and Varric, basking in the late warmth, going over a set of leather bound ledgers and watching Fenris spar with Isabela. Macie was on the other end of the boat, with Bethany and Merrill, getting a lesson in common herbs and their uses. And thinking very little of it, from the bored expression on her face._ _

__"So, anyway, Hawke. I think you're pretty well set." Varric smugly looked at her over the edge of one of the books._ _

__Aeryn flashed Sebastian a dimple, but waved her slim hand, dismissingly._ _

__"Go stand over there and look pretty, love. The grownups are talking about money."_ _

__Sebastian chuckled at the saucy wink she gave him as she tugged him down to sit on the crates alongside her and Varric. He sat his pack and armor down, letting it clatter to the side._ _

__The gold and white plate earned itself Aeryn’s despairing glance and she added, "Remind me to look up that armorer in Denerim Meridan was going on about. Wade, I think his name was."_ _

__Sebastian frowned. The armor his father had sent him once Sebastian had taken his vows was showing its wear, always meant to be more ornamental than used, and Sebastian had used it hard in the last years. But he'd kept it well, he thought. "There's no need to lay the expense out, Aeryn. It's serviceable yet."_ _

__She frowned back at him and smoothed a pleat in the shoulder of his tunic. "We're going to court in Denerim. I want you to look well against the nobles and while it's serviceable, I know for a fact it's not as practical as is should be. And hang the expense. Void, Sebastian. What else is money for except to make sure you're well kitted out?"_ _

__That caught him short. Hesitantly, Sebastian said, "I had rather assumed that since you couldn't sell the estate and we left so quickly that the financial situation might be more than a wee bit precarious." He'd never gotten to ask Varric to invest his endowment, but he knew the coin he’d collected was paltry in the face of the cost of a campaign._ _

__Sebastian noted a merry sparkle in Aeryn’s eyes, though, and wondered._ _

__Varric snorted but when Sebastian continued to look concerned the dwarf raised his eyebrows at Hawke, who shrugged. "Really?"_ _

__"Maker, Varric. It's not like we didn't have other things to talk about."_ _

__"Well, yeah, Hawke. But I didn't realize...Choir Boy, what do you think she did with all the stuff?"_ _

__When Sebastian turned to her questioningly, Aeryn clarified. "He means...ah, well. You know me and my light fingers?” She waggled said able digits. “And we really did collect rather a lot of trinkets in our time."_ _

__"Well, aye. But you were paying us and running the estate. And funding the clinic, the apartments in Lowtown..."_ _

__"True. But, Sebastian? Have you ever seen me wearing jewels or going on shopping sprees?" More that it was dangerous to wear the fruits of a thief’s labor, since the victims might recognize their former property, but the safety that money provided had been a greater temptation, Aeryn admitted freely._ _

__He blinked. No. Actually, other than the rune-marked items she wore to bolster her leathers, Sebastian had never seen her in so much as a delicate ring or a jeweled hairpin. It had been something that had bothered him, had made him wonder. As much as Aeryn loved beautiful things, she’d never been one to adorn herself in them, living as simply as a cleric in many ways._ _

__Varric tapped the ledgers, drawing Sebastian’s attention. "It all went straight to gold, kid."_ _

__"And Varric took that gold and used it strategically. Placed it here and there. Stashed it, using his Carta and Guild ties."_ _

__"Basically, if dwarves are there, Hawke's got a bankroll tucked in somewhere safe. Plus, some of it got stockpiled and after you two got chummy with King Alistair I've transferred a good deal of it into Ferelden."_ _

__Aeryn handed Sebastian the ledger she'd been holding. She and Varric looked entirely amused. Of course, that could be because he was gaping like a fish. Sebastian closed his mouth. These were, ah, healthy figures. "And this is just in Denerim?"_ _

She curled her hand around his elbow. "I've _been_ poor, Sebastian. It's a survivable condition, but I don't really recommend it." 

Old plans. Back doors, Aeryn had called her measures that they had used to escape Kirkwall, he was reminded. There was a flash of old, raw pain dark in her eyes, even as her lush mouth curved wryly and Sebastian sat his hand on hers and squeezed.

You are, as always, a capable woman, _leannan_. I don't know why it would ever occur to me otherwise."

Her dimple flashed in a proper smile. "Well, there's Varric and Isabela to thank for it. They gave me the idea and the avenues. Bela's got hoards all over the coastline, like a dragon."

At a call from Japeth by the ship’s wheel, Aeryn glanced over the side of the ship. They were slowly entering back into the shallower waters off the Fereldan coast and turning towards Denerim. The sky was turning a deep shade of rose as the sun started to sink. The mast above them creaked ominously, but held still. Time to find a port, make their winter quarters, get the ship squared away, and settle into the hard business of planning a coup. 

Denerim lay before them, now. There, Sebastian would have to step away from her, from being just her archer, her heart, and begin to make his way as Prince. Aeryn knew that, for him – to help him become what he wanted, she would need to pull up the lady, the first mask she’d ever learned, taught at her mother’s knee and refined in Kirkwall’s hard school. 

Pull it up. Wear it. Perfect it. For him. _How long can you keep it up, Aeryn, for Alistair’s court? In Starkhaven?_

__Sebastian felt Aeryn shiver and, worried, set his arm about her, drawing her closer to the warmth of his body, hoping she hadn’t taken another chill in the evening air._ _


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  ** _Author’s Notes:_** Denerim, finally! Dierdre is my OFC, met briefly in Tales from the Shelterverse, and some of the references that are unfamiliar are also addressed in those stories and Chap 23 of Shelter. Main point of interest is that in this ‘verse, Alistair and Lyna Mahariel were in a relationship until she sacrificed herself. 
> 
> Hope you all enjoy. Thanks to mille libri for her beta skills!

The Denerim port was chaotic as ships jockeyed for positions and berths. Aeryn had to pull Macie down from the riggings twice as the girl tried to find the best vantage point to scope out the brightly colored sails, the exotic crews and the bustling dockside. It took Isabela screeching that she'd have the kid for fish bait if she set one finger on the delicate patch job on the mast and Merrill finding Macie a safe spot to watch from the long boat lashed to the side to finally settle her.

The companions dispersed to collect their gear. Aeryn came up first to lean against the rail and watch a pair of gulls hover over the main mast.

Fenris came up just behind her, but the contemplative cast to her features, the slight hunch to her shoulders, made him pause. Despite being on the ship together for weeks, they had not had many chances to talk alone. Hawke and Sebastian had required a period of peace, it had seemed. A time to cement what they had begun in Kirkwall. But, Fenris had missed his evenings alone with his partner, in the last months. He nudged her shoulder with his own, after watching her for a moment. "Hawke?"

"Yeah, Fenris?"

"You are quiet." And it seemed to him that there was a worry in her eyes but he would refrain from bringing it up until he understood what caused it.

Aeryn angled her crooked smile at him. "I do shut up occasionally, you know."

"You are the quietest woman I ever met, unless you are trying to draw attention.” Fenris leaned over the railing next to her, not quite touching, but well within her space. Hawke radiated heat and it had always drawn him in. Drawing his black brows down, he tried again. “But you seem apprehensive. Are you worried about our reception? The king seems to have made it clear we are welcome in Ferelden."

She shrugged, still staring out over the water. The dark red bangs fell over her face, hiding her eyes from him. Tell him or not? "No, it's more that...This is where it starts, Fenris."

"What starts?"

"Where Sebastian has to start being Prince of Starkhaven. Where I have to start...not being just a fast knife in the dark."

Fenris frowned openly at her, then. What was this about? "Hawke, you have never been "just a fast knife."

"Oh, now, you know that's not true." There was a wicked curl to her lip and he nodded, reluctantly. 

He did know, better than most, about the way Hawke had allowed her work to swallow her. But it was years in the past. They had both set aside the worst of themselves. Why would it bother her now?

“Are we both to judge ourselves forever on what we did when we had very little choice?”

"I don't know, Fenris. I...it's going to be a long game. I'm not sure I'm up to the task, is all."

A game. This was how Hawke was wont to refer to the ruses she and Varric used to manipulate people. "Perhaps you should not think of it that way?"

Aeryn pressed back against his shoulder briefly, as she thought about what to tell him. "You know me, Fenris. I can play the lady. I've just never had to..." Sebastian emerged from the hatch and Aeryn shifted her body, straightening and casting a brighter look over her features. "Never mind. All set?" she called to Sebastian.

"I seem to have myself in order, yes." He noticed something odd about the way Fenris was looking at Aeryn, concern etched in the line between the elf's deep green eyes. "Did I interrupt something, then?"

Fenris paused then shook his head, negatively. It was not his place to bring this up with Sebastian. He needed to talk with Hawke again, first. Though the fact that she was hiding something from her lover, his friend, made Fenris deeply uneasy.

Aeryn raised her arched brows and blinked. "I don't think so. We were just wondering what to expect."

"You've never been to Denerim?" Sebastian slid his arm around her waist and she settled against him.

"Void, no. Too many pilgrims and Templars. I...ah, once heard that there were more Templars in Denerim than at Kinloch Hold." Well, that's what Father had said, but Aeryn was wary of mentioning Malcolm to Sebastian. "Still, it's Ferelden. I expect it just to be like Amaranthine or Highever, only...more so, I'd guess. Isabela said to watch for thieves and to stay out of alleys. It'll probably feel almost familiar." A slight laugh escaped her, but Aeryn could still feel Fenris' disapproving gaze.

Sebastian heard the slight hesitation and grimaced. He had attacked her father so often that she was wary of referring to Malcolm, even casually. He would have to correct that, but for now he steered them to a safer topic. "I knew several sisters who made pilgrimages here to the shrine to Andraste."

Aeryn nodded but Fenris scoffed. "I believe many places claim the right of Andraste's birthplace. Jader, for instance."

Wagging a cautionary finger at him, Aeryn warned him. "Oh, now. I wouldn't say that in mixed company, Fenris. Fereldans are proprietary about their claim to the Maker's Bride."

"Fereldans seem to be convinced that there is nothing of any good that comes from anywhere else."

Sebastian came gallantly to Ferelden’s defense, solemn, but with a twinkle in his eyes. "It is well known that Andraste spent her early years here in Denerim. Why complicate matters by having her born elsewhere?"

There, that had Fenris distracted. Aeryn swallowed a sigh of relief. There were pitfalls to allowing your friends to know you too well.

Aeryn listened to Fenris and Sebastian debate Andraste's origins, needing only the occasional interjection from her on Fereldan customs, and reviewed her plans.

Isabela had her ship to get squared away and Bethany and Merrill would keep an eye on Macie, while Aeryn, Fenris, Sebastian, and Varric made their way to the palace to let King Alistair know they had come to spend the winter in Denerim. Just in case the king had any objections, now that they were somewhat fugitive, instead of just travelers.

Then, with any luck they could find a reasonable place to rent for the winter and get settled in. In the back of her mind, Aeryn had a small vision of cozy scenes; crackling fires, bowls of steaming stews and pies, romps in the snow that would soon be falling, friends coming and going and for once, no one depending on her to bear up a whole city on her fallible back. No decisions beyond what to buy for Saturnalia and whether there should be goose or roast beef on the table. Both, maybe. And that fish pie thing that Sebastian was so fond of. 

And maybe a nice bout with banditti now and again for a bit of exercise. 

Aeryn chuckled at herself and her pipe dreams, calling the attention of Sebastian and Fenris, but she waved them off. Sebastian cuddled her a little closer and made a point about the center of Andrastian lore being focused on the Fereldan coast that Fenris countered with a small fact about Orlesian scrolls dating from just before the rebellion that documented some journey made to the Marches. 

Varric joined them, Bianca gleaming with a new coat of wax over his broad shoulder, smirking at Fenris and Sebastian's continuing debate and throwing in a comment here and there to stir the fire.

They were nearly ready to go when Macie threw a wrench into the works, objecting to being left behind. "I thought you said I was free to go when I was safe. Ain't no one looking for me, here."

"I did, true. But I don't know anyone here, either, Macie. If you get into trouble, you're on your own. If you can wait a few hours, then I can make some contacts and you'll have a little freedom to explore." The girl still looked sullen and Aeryn, paused, worried. Macie might not be as amenable to being rescued as they thought. Aeryn knew that she, herself, would have resented being so bound by rules after being on her own so long. 

Sebastian knelt down to talk to her and Macie eyed the archer, doubtfully. "It won't be long, lass. Wait for us to look over the city, please?" And because it wasn't just Aeryn who had difficulty saying no to those blue eyes, Macie huffed and nodded.

Merrill sidled up and whispered. "I think, maybe, I know where Hawke stashed the last of that sugared nut cake, Macie. Want to come check?" The girl let herself be led off and Aeryn sent a grateful look after Merrill.

Standing, Sebastian watched after them, worriedly. "I suppose I thought she'd be happy to be away from that life and safe."

Aeryn patted his arm, soothingly. "I imagine she's just more used to making her own way. It'll take time, love." And hopefully, that's all it was. "C'mon, let's go."

Denerim bustled in the crisp late autumn air. They had to walk through several districts, crossing the bridges that gained in beauty and better construction as they approached the Palace, tucked under Fort Drakon, which was in turn over-shadowed by the mountain. It was a teeming, over-crowded jumble, with new buildings stuck cheek by jowl with older.

There were eyes on them the whole time. Aeryn had decided they would take the chance and come into the city armed and ready. Amaranthine had proved friendly enough to well-armed visitors and Denerim had its reputation as being just this side of lawless. 

No one seemed to want to challenge them in broad daylight, at least, and they managed to steer clear of blind alleys and cut-offs, only getting turned around once and drawing the alarmed attention of a harried middle aged woman pinning out her wash. She'd given them directions friendly enough.

Bunting hanging all along the main street lent a festival atmosphere, even in the dingier, more dangerous areas near the dockside. Music spilled out of taverns into the streets, as did a drunk or two. The thoroughfare had recently had its flagged path guttered with a dun colored stone, still bearing the marks of its recent cutting.

Several other areas bore signs of new construction and when they passed the Alienage, it was plain that a great deal of effort had gone into making the walled ghetto a more livable place; the road passing through was newly paved in gray stone and several carts were passing through carrying in goods, with both human and elvhen drivers. They could just see the vhenadahl, nearly leafless now, poking over the fence.

In the marketplace, there were a dozen booths selling food and decorative items, hawkers calling out the superiority of their fried eggplant or sausage, and a banner hung declaring the city's good wishes for Queen Dierdre's nameday, which explained the appearance of jesters and mummers and other colorful types, all chivvying the crowd for attention and coin.

"Wait till the kid gets a load of this. She'll think she's in paradise." Varric grinned at the mixed crowd and Aeryn had to agree. This was a pickpocket's Golden City. All sorts jostling together and none with a wary enough eye on their purse. It made _her_ fingers itch. 

Instead, she took Sebastian’s arm, sculpted and strong under the doeskin sleeve, and he gave her a small grin as set his large hand over hers. “Hands to yourself, _mo chridhe_.”

Aeryn’s smirk was self-deprecatory and he squeezed her clever fingers. “That’s the idea.”

Eventually, they made it to the Palace District. They had to wait for a short parade of daintily dressed ladies and children, apparently just returning from a presentation at court. Aeryn cast a measuring eye on the women's clothing. It wasn't just Sebastian's wardrobe that needed updating, if these were examples of court wear.

While they waited at the palace gatehouse for the messenger to carry an announcing note to Alistair, Sebastian noticed a small, discreetly fenced area, surrounded by neatly tended yews. A group of robed Chantry mothers had stopped to remove their sandals and walked in through the open gate, barefoot even on this chilly day. He touched Aeryn's shoulder to draw her attention. "Is that the shrine to Andraste?"

Aeryn glanced it over. "I don't know. It's around here, I think." She tilted her head. "Go and see, Sebastian."

"Oh, no. It's fine. I can wait. We'll be in the city a good while." His eyes didn't leave the gate, though, she noticed, a little amused. 

Sebastian’s thoughts were running. Even if it wasn't truly Her spot, it was made sacred by the devotion of nearly a thousand years of pilgrimage. He would _like_ to start out his journey to becoming Prince in more than name by kneeling in such a place, but...

Aeryn’s warm voice cut in on his reverie. "Go on. That messenger didn't appear to be in much of a hurry. We'll be out here a while."

Sebastian continued to gaze at the small park, and then asked, gently, "Come with me, then?" He didn't like to push Aeryn on these things, but...something was nagging at him to have her along with him and Sebastian had long ago stopped resisting such impulses.

"Oh...I don't..." He had her hand, thumb stroking along the palm, and he was looking at her through his lashes and it was sodding unfair. "Alright. Fine. Maker's Breath, Sebastian." He didn't even blush at manipulating her, just gave his sweet smile. She was clearly a bad influence. "Fenris? Varric? Care to come see?"

"Nah, Hawke. I leave the shrine visiting to other folks. I'll wait here. You going, Broody?"

Fenris considered them for a moment and shook his head. "No. I believe I will wait with Varric. Perhaps later."

Sebastian was tugging at her hand and she swallowed back a smile. You could always tell when Sebastian really wanted something, she thought. He fell back into the impulsive patterns that must have marked him as a youth, a bounce in his step. Aeryn felt a sudden return of the old wish to have known him before his Chantry days and she couldn't hide the soft curve of her lips, now, as she watched the eager light play across the striking planes of his face.

They pulled up to unlace their boots and Aeryn knotted her laces and tossed them over her shoulder. Sebastian did the same and went to unshoulder his bow and quiver.

Aeryn stopped him. "Ah...Sebastian..."

"I don't mean to go armed into this sacred space, _mo chridhe_." His voice was grave and the eager look slipped away to something uncompromising as he sat his grandfather's bow on the low shelf meant for such a purpose and observed her down his aristocratic nose.

Biting at her lip, Aeryn nodded finally. "Alright." But she made no move to unbuckle her scabbards.

"Aeryn, please?" After Petrice's betrayal, Aeryn had never again come into the Chantry unarmed. But this was not Kirkwall and this space was holy in a way the repurposed Tevinter structure could never have been.

Her chin set, and there were shadows in the depth of her eyes. "No. I...maybe I should just wait here."

Sebastian's jaw clenched. Aeryn had her reasons. Long years of endless betrayal by and in the Chantry. He knew that. But, Maker, surely this was different. "No, I want you with me. Come on then." The moment had lost the sweetness, though.

Aeryn inwardly flinched. The bright blue eyes had gone a little cold. She'd upset him. Sebastian was taking this personally, that Aeryn couldn't set aside all the times sacred had meant nothing to slavers and raiders and Templars. Not even to one Mother. As if it meant Aeryn didn't trust _him_. Her hesitation had dimmed the light and the eagerness in him. This wasn't a teasing manipulation, now. He was asking her to make a choice.

Oh, flames. Well, _now_ what? The coolness in his eyes made her skin tight. A few years ago and she'd have walked away from him, then, with a quip. Walked back to her friends and said something inappropriate to Varric and smirked when Sebastian had rejoined them. 

But she had told Sebastian she did not resent his devotions. And she _didn't_. Nor did she want Sebastian to walk into what could be a trap with no back-up. When she had sent him to the Chantry in Amaranthine, she'd sent him with Bethany, who could call up her defenses with a gesture and a word. Aeryn had seen Sebastian at prayer. All that immense focus narrowed down to his faith and it made him vulnerable. 

But she didn’t need her daggers to be dangerous to anything that could harm him. And this was important to him. And maybe…maybe it was time for a new road. 

So.

Slowly, Aeryn flicked the buckles holding her daggers and shrugged out of the straps. She did not remove her small knives, lethal little things stashed in several locations on her body. Her poisons and bombs stayed in their pouch on her belt. But she'd set those primary weapons aside, the visible mark of her trade, to take his hand. And it took every ounce of willpower Sebastian had not to shout.

"Thank you, _à ruin_." Lifting their hands, he kissed the pale blue veins running on the inside of her wrist. Oh, Holy Maker, please, _please_ reward this. Please don't let her trust in me be false. Just this once.

And with that fervent prayer he led her through the gate.

Aeryn followed, trying very hard not to think how easy it would be for enemies to shadow themselves between the tall, slender evergreens. How those innocent looking women who had come in before them could have poisoned knives hidden in the folds of their robes. 

It was so easy for the perilous to pretend innocence.

Past the yews, there was a neatly clipped thyme and chamomile lawn and in the center, the Birth Stone; a rounded white monolith, ten feet tall, with a simple clearly cut inscription, " _Let mine be the last sacrifice. Let there be peace in the Maker's Light_."

The open space, with no one but the group of plainly robed barefoot mothers, served to reassure Aeryn somewhat, but Sebastian could still feel tension in the exaggerated grace of her stride and the set, reserved expression as her wide eyes took in every movement of the surrounding trees and the women in the sunlit glade. They were singing appropriately, the Canticle of Andraste, and Sebastian felt moved to join them as they knelt.

Aeryn untangled her fingers from his, feeling him tug her forward again.

Sebastian opened his mouth to speak, caught the mulish set of her chin, and then nodded and turned to the stone. He'd asked as much of her as he could.

Kneeling, he joined the mothers in their Chant as Aeryn stood in silent guard behind him. Sebastian was blessed with an almost instant sense of pervading peace, that rare feeling that only occasionally stole over him in his meditation. This, then, seemed to be what was wanted. Just that Aeryn was present. He let his voice run under their descant.

Aeryn could smell the incense wafting up from the robes of the women on the cool breeze. It was a different type from that which had always clung to Sebastian, lighter, with a hint of lavender and maybe...lemon peel. The green dusty scent of the herbs that were crushing beneath the pilgrims' knees complemented it. 

It should have been pleasant and Aeryn had to force back a bubble of resentment, that what would be comforting and soothing to any other person made her anxious. Reminded her of traps and ambushes. Reminded her of long years when incense had just been one more lingering sign of what she couldn't have.

Void. That's not helping. Aeryn flicked up her hood, to cut off the breeze. She wanted to prowl, to check the corners of the small clearing, but it felt disrespectful to move too much. Sebastian's focus wouldn't suffer, but the mothers didn't need her pacing like a caged animal just beyond their sight. Her own mother had once told her it felt like she was about to swoop down on them and yank them away from their worship, like Hawke might resemble her name a bit too much.

She took a calming breath through her mouth. If the incense was disconcerting, Aeryn could listen to Sebastian. The lilt of his brogue faded when he sang, but the warm voice remained rich and familiar running down the verse's counter melody. The women were well trained and it was clear they were used to singing with a male voice. 

There wasn't anything wrong, here. It was fine. And Sebastian was singing. Aeryn could feel the velvety rub of it like a stroke down the long line of her back. She couldn’t quite relax, the way she managed when he prayed for them privately, but it was easier to be still.

Aeryn stayed still for the half hour that it took to finish the Canticle, beginning to fidget only as time marched on.

When Sebastian rolled up to his feet, knowing they needed to return to the gate, the shadows had shifted around them, obscuring Aeryn so that it seemed she might have called them up. Hooded, now, he noticed. Still and quiet and respectful, but ready to spin into motion at the first sign of trouble. There was tension in her jaw and the set of her lips. What had been centering and calming for him had given her no such respite, he thought regretfully. 

Aeryn's eyes shifted, though, and out of the corner of his vision, Sebastian saw one of the mothers, an elderly, frail woman, attempt to stand only to stagger. He quickly caught her elbow and steadied her. The younger mother next to her smiled her thanks and then continued on in Chant with the others.

The old woman heaved a deep breath, smoothing a few strands of wispy white hair back into her bun. Old she might be, but her voice didn’t quaver. "Thank you, child. You have done Andraste great service this day, lending your voice to strengthen our efforts in praise."

Sebastian bowed. "Thank you, Your Reverence. It is only right to offer praise and thanks."

"This is true. I am Revered Mother Alyce. May I offer you and your..." her rheumy blue eyes flicked to Aeryn in her blending black leather with its buffed fastenings and back to Sebastian in his shining white and gold, "guard a blessing before you return to your duties?"

Aeryn had never once taken a blessing from Elthina, who, to be fair, had not offered after Aeryn's mocking dismissal that first time. Years ago, now. And mocked to deflect, Sebastian knew, too. But she was on edge and Sebastian didn't want to chance that his love would turn that sharp edge to the mother’s offer. "This is my lady, Your Reverence, not my guard. But I would..."

" _We_ would be honored, Your Reverence." Aeryn's voice was smooth and light as she pushed back the hood and stepped into the light. Her gentle expression belied her armor, as though she was merely wearing a costume, and she offered as respectful a curtsy as Sebastian had ever seen her give.

"Oh, forgive my assumption!" The woman blinked at Aeryn's transformation. Sebastian shared her surprise. Aeryn had come to respect Elthina, in the end, but she had never given an acknowledgement of the Grand Cleric’s authority.

"Not at all. I simply do not sing so well as the Prince. I prefer to allow his voice to speak praise in such overwhelmingly moving surroundings." He recognized Leandra's elegant tones and demure phrasing and posture. Little mimic. 

"All voices are welcome in the Chant of Light, child." Mother Alyce patted Aeryn's arm in a comforting (only _slightly_ patronizing) manner. "But it must be said that very few voices are as pleasing as the, ah, _Prince's_?" The lined face wore a calculating look now and her last word was clearly an inquiry. 

That’s that, then. Now we’re on the road to Sebastian’s throne. Chantry women were _such_ gossips. Aeryn hid her satisfaction in a shy duck of her head. 

"Sebastian Vael, Your Reverence. I am a prince of Starkhaven, it is true. But such titles are meaningless in the eyes of our Maker." He directed that in a firm tone to Aeryn, who simply widened her eyes. But a slight blush stole across her cheeks and he wondered how she managed to control even that, as it drew a soft smile from the old woman.

"Oh, now. Don't scold her, poor dear. I admit, if a prince had claimed me as his lady when I was a young woman, I might have been a bit boastful as well."

"Forgive me." And Sebastian had to hand it to Aeryn and her bright eyes behind downcast lashes. The soft hesitation in her voice made _him_ want to apologize and he knew better.

"Nonsense. Now, kneel down and be held together in the Maker's Light." They knelt in the close cropped thyme to receive the blessing and Sebastian couldn't help the tiny thrill running through him, to be holding Aeryn’s small, rough hand in this sacred space with a mother laying her hands on their heads. A sweet glimpse of the future, he could only hope. And caught in that, Sebastian forgot his curiosity as to why Aeryn had allowed it.

Aeryn felt his callused thumb stroke along her own and swallowed a smile. Well, she'd laid it on a bit thick, perhaps, but it was a good start. Sebastian was happy with her again, anyway.

>>> \----- >

"Maker's Breath, Hawke. I thought you two were just going to sight see. I didn't think you'd decided to make a day of it." Varric grumbled as she and Sebastian trotted back across the paved courtyard to rejoin their friends.

"Sorry. Did we miss a summons?"

Fenris answered, pointing to a thin man in palace livery. "The messenger just returned. He hasn't approached us yet."

Aeryn cynically wondered if it was because the young man hadn't wanted to give the note to a dwarf and an elf, or if he'd just been awaiting their return as he turned immediately to them upon spying Sebastian and her. Fenris' cocked eyebrow told her she wasn't alone in her suspicions and she traded a smirk with her partner before smilingly addressing the messenger.

He bowed with a fair deal more elegance and respect than he had when taking their names earlier. "King Alistair requests your attendance in the throne room. In his name, you are most welcome to Ferelden." Escorting them to the twelve-foot high double doors, carved with facing rampant mabari, the messenger turned them over to a page boy, also resplendent in the red and gold Theirin livery, who led the way after taking their names.

The four companions surreptitiously observed their surroundings. The palace was built gracefully, if a bit simply, to eyes grown used to the Tevinter buildings used by the nobility of Kirkwall. The hall they walked was built of grey stone to eye height and then continued loftily in open timberframe and half timber. Golden autumn light streamed in through an extravagant use of glass in the upper reaches of the rafters.

The thick blue carpet beneath their feet muffled the sounds of their boots as they followed the page to another set of doors carved with the mabari, carefully painted to draw attention to the carving. There were stone mabari forming the newel posts of a set of stairs curving up to a second floor and set in stained glass. 

"I had thought the Ferelden obsession with dogs to be an exaggeration. Apparently not." Fenris whispered as they walked.

"Mabari aren’t just _dogs_. But we like them, too."

Varric asked,"I always wondered, Hawke, why you didn't have one. It seemed like you would, being, well...you."

"We did have one, a gift from a friend of Father's. It bonded with Carver, though. Died at Ostagar, in the first charge." Sebastian pressed his hand to the small of her back and Aeryn gave him a wan smile, chasing away the brief shadow that had crossed her face. "I never had a lot of time for a pet, really."

"What was its name?"

Aeryn huffed a laugh. "Oh. Well. Chompy."

Varric's and Sebastian's laughter barked out and echoed in the hall and even Fenris had to chuckle.

"Bethany's fault. Chompy kept eating her dolls. And our shoes. The knitting. And the occasional farm tool. Carver tried to get her to answer to Destroyer or Avenger or something more...er, fitting, but Chompy is what stuck. She was a good hound, though. Had a fine nose."

The page, who had been appropriately silent until then, took a moment to whisper. "The Hero's mabari companion, Fen'misu, just had a litter of pups. They're so little and wriggly!" His eyes were wide and green and Aeryn grinned at him and his freckles, before the doors to the throne room opened and the page handed them off to the attendant.

They were announced and Alistair's loud battlefield trained voice rang out. "Hawke! Welcome home! Come join us and let me introduce you to my Queen, Dierdre." Aeryn eyed the warden-king as they walked the length of the throne room to where Alistair was standing, leaning against his throne on the dais. He seemed better rested than he had in Kirkwall, the shadows gone from beneath his hazel eyes, and there was a less strained line to his wide shouldered form.

The companions were carefully observed, too. Ferelden’s nobles were as often clad in armor as in elegant fabrics, but there was the ever-present undercurrent of intrigue and curiosity that seemed to be the normal buzz of a court, no matter where it was, Sebastian thought.

After making their bows, Aeyrn apologized to Dierdre, tall and stately, dark blonde hair with coppery streaks and a few faded freckles sprinkled across her nose. For a minute, Aeryn was reminded a little of Aveline, though Dierdre's features were more delicately molded and the queen lacked a warrior’s well-defined musculature.

"I am sorry, Your Majesty. We've been at sea for sometime and did not realize we were intruding upon a celebration. Many happy returns of the day!" And noting that the Queen had her hand resting on a slight bump at the midriff of her bronze figured silk gown, "And, if I may, our best wishes for your other good news, as well."

A delighted smile broke out across the lovely woman's face. "You may, thank you. And please, do not worry about such a silly thing as my nameday. I did try to get my lord to stop counting a few years ago, but he insists."

"Nonsense, m'dear. You grow lovelier with each passing day. Such things should be celebrated." Alistair bowed elegantly to his queen with a fond smile. "Your timing is excellent, Hawke. We were about to withdraw to elevenses and I want to hear your news. Where’s the rest of your crew?"

Deirdre's brown eyes sparkled as she scolded. "Alistair, they've been on a voyage. Perhaps we should show them their rooms and let them be refreshed before making them report?"

Aeryn exchanged uncertain glances with Sebastian. "Oh. We hadn't expected to stay here, Your Majesty." They still hadn't ascertained whether or not Alistair knew the truth of Kirkwall. It might not be politic for them to stay in the Palace, with the King's patronage.

He pointed a finger at her chidingly. "Alistair, Hawke. Remember." 

She nodded, but, still. "Alistair, then. But we..." That caused the buzz in the room to pick up. While Alistair’s familiarity was well known in Ferelden, not many chose to return it. But these strangers did. That news would be making the rounds.

"Nope, won't hear any objections. We've got a whole palace. It's an excuse to air out the rooms."

Sebastian spoke up, "Your M..."

The King leveled a soldier's glare on the Prince. "Alistair. Or I will start to be offended, Prince Vael." Another unsubtle buzz ran through the crowd.

Sebastian smiled and raised his hands, conceding the point. "Alistair, we had planned to stay in Denerim for the winter before making our way to Starkhaven. That's a long..."

"And if you stay here, we can have all sorts of meetings and conferences and so on. It's convenient, we’ve even got a group of ambassadors from the Marches, now. No, that's enough. How many rooms, do you think, Deirdre?" He waved up his seneschal, Brendan, a short graying blond man with a decided limp.

"Your Majesty?" The seneschal had a gravelly, strained voice, clearly caused by the scars across his throat.

"Let's get our visitors set up, Brendan. What, six rooms, two suites and a couple of nice sitting rooms?"

Contemplating only for a moment, Brendan answered, "The west third floor would be appropriate, sire."

"Oh, you'll like that." Deirdre smiled. "Quiet in the morning, lovely light in the evening and they overlook the rose garden." Aeryn noted that the queen's smile went just a little stiff on the last words, but it was a brief anomaly.

Sebastian had already noted that Alistair still wore the small delicate ring, enameled with a red rose, on the smallest finger of his shield hand.

Of course, Alistair had also noticed that neither Hawke nor Sebastian were wearing any rings other than the rune-marked rings that boosted their armor, so he returned Sebastian's glance with a raised eyebrow. "Any happy news I should be congratulating you on, Vael?"

"Just that we made it through a rather bad storm. Captain Isabela's ship is in dock for repair for a while."

"Oh? Brendan, send a note to Faron, have him call on the good Captain. Did she name it _Siren's Call_ , again?"

Varric grinned. "That would be the name, Alistair."

"Faron's the royal shipwright. He'll get whatever she needs. I owe Isabela a favor, anyway."

"Alistair..if you're insisting..."

"Oh, I am." He smiled with good humor.

Dipping a curtsy in a mock surrender, Aeryn turned to Brendan. "My room needs a smaller attached room for my, ah, ward."

He nodded. "That should be no problem, my lady. Most of the suites have attached rooms for servants. Did you bring any staff?"

"No."

"I will assign maids and footmen, then.” 

"Oh. That's really not..." The man bowed, ignoring Aeryn’s protest and went to speak to an elvhen servant who scurried away, apparently to set orders in motion. Sodding Void, walk into a palace and suddenly your life wasn’t your own. Aeryn felt a bit off center, but pushed it away. “Alistair, I really need to speak with you, a bit more..." She waved a hand, indicating the listening bunches of nobles.

"I see...Alright, let’s adjourn.” The king made a small gesture and Brendan announced the end of the morning court. Alistair and Dierdre preceded them out into a less ornate sitting room, where a small tea was laid out.

The queen poured and the companions found themselves served and seated on the large comfortable settles set around a blazing fire.

Alistair counted up the facts he knew on his fingers. "Let's see. An apostate who seems to have been part of your crew blew up the Chantry.” His genial expression turned solemn when he turned to Sebastian. “My condolences, on that, by the way, Sebastian.”

“Thank you. They stand at the hand of the Maker.” His response was reflexive, his voice tight, but Aeryn laid an unobtrusive, comforting hand against his back and he felt the knot of grief loosen again. 

The king continued, “Knight Commander Meredith declared a Right of Annulment, so you then led a charge into the Gallows to rescue your sister, which resulted in the deaths of the first enchanter and the knight commander, a fair number of Templars and almost all the mages, and then you all, including the apostate, disappeared into the chaos."

Nonplussed, Aeryn blinked wide eyes at him. "Umm. Well, yes."

There was a reckless, knowing sort of charm in Alistair’s grin, now. "Being a king does have a privilege or two, Hawke. And I've got my contacts. I knew Knight Commander Cullen when he was stationed at Kinloch. Met him a few times in training, too. After my...less than useful meeting with Meredith, I sent him a note. We've been keeping each other informed."

"Cullen's Commander, now?" She'd have to remember to tell Bethany.

"Yup."

"Did he say anything about Guard Captain Hendyr?"

Alistair considered. "That's right. The Guard Captain was one of yours. Let me...I think he's mentioned her once or twice as the only reason most of the city is still standing."

Sebastian saw a thread of tension relax in Aeryn's form and she smiled when Fenris spoke. "That is good to hear."

"Kirkwall's still standing." Varric almost beamed. "That's fantastic."

"Were you in doubt?"

"Considering how it looked when we left?" The dwarf snorted. "Yeah, a little bit." Alistair glanced at the rest of them and they all had similar agreeing expressions.

"But you still left?" Alistair’s voice held a note of condemnation and Aeryn met it head on.

"Trust me, no one there wanted my help anymore. And to be honest, I'd been trying to leave Kirkwall for about, oh, six years at that point." Aeryn glanced down at her drink, watching the amber hued tea swirl in its thin porcelain cup, a few leaves floating. "It was mostly my fault, Alistair. I don't think..."

"Aeryn..."

She pushed aside his comforting hand. "No, Sebastian. It was. I'm the reason Anders was able to do what he did, because I ran protection for him for seven years. I'm the reason that the idol was in Kirkwall for Meredith to get her hands on it. She was already addled, but that thing made her...insane and powerful. I'm apparently wanted for murder in Orlais. I'm a thief and an assassin and my sister is an apostate. Alistair deserves to know exactly who he just offered sanctuary to."

Dierdre looked terribly startled and her hand had moved protectively across her belly, Aeryn saw, out of the corner of her eye, with a sinking feeling. So much for being welcome. 

Alistair regarded Aeryn for a moment in a level gaze and Sebastian held his breath. This was a toss of the dice, really. More than he liked to risk weighed on how Alistair received them. It would be a far sight easier to retake Starkhaven with an ally and a retreat such as this, if they needed it.

Crossing the room in a stride, the king approached, and Fenris went stiffly on guard at Aeryn’s off side. She sent him a quelling glance, but the elf didn’t take his eyes off the Warden King. The man didn’t look armed, but Fenris was well aware that looks were deceiving. 

Alistair offered his hand to Aeryn who took it, hesitantly. "My Lady Hawke. I know who I offer sanctuary to. Did you think I lived this long without trusting my instincts but checking things out? One of my better friends in this world is a thief and an assassin. And he spoke well of you last time we met." He squeezed her fingers before releasing her and raised his eyebrows at Fenris, who relaxed finally. 

"Who…oh, Zevran Arainai. I had forgotten that you were friends." 

Sebastian recalled the assassin they had aided, helping him to eliminate the group of Antivans who had been following. The ex-Crow and Aeryn had seemed to understand each other somewhat, though he’d not cared for the elf’s easy flirting. 

"Zev liked you a lot. And despite appearances, that doesn't happen often.” 

The queen shifted uncomfortably, drawing Sebastian’s gaze. He looked her over, but Dierdre didn’t seem overly distressed, now. Perhaps her child had moved. Oh. The image of Aeryn, with her hand on her own curved belly flashed through his mind’s eye and Sebastian leaned towards his love, feeling her shoulder press his, briefly. He doubted that Aeryn realized what he was thinking of. They should talk more of such things. Not just at the moment, though, probably. Sebastian shook himself away from his distraction.

“No, Hawke, between Cullen and Zev and my own observations, I’ve got no qualms about having you around. I'm a king because of a very long list of unforeseen circumstances. Sod that. I'm alive because of an even longer list. You can't allow for the strangeness of this world. It is what it is, right? I don't hold you to blame for any of it, and unless you've got a better reason than "I touched something that was already broken and it fell apart despite my trying everything to fix it," you are all welcome in my home. For the winter or longer, if Starkhaven doesn't pan out. To be honest, I have a few things I could use your sort of help with."

Aeryn’s shoulders went straighter. “Oh?” She wouldn’t mind so much, if Alistair needed her particular brand of help.

“There are elements in Ferelden, and possibly elsewhere, that aren’t thrilled with our good news.” Alistair sat back on the settle with Dierdre and patted her knee. “And we’ve had a few mages take advantage of my offer of sanctuary and mock it by openly using blood magic. The Templars that have remained in Ferelden are mostly under control of the Grand Cleric here, Geneva. And she’s got a bit of a grudge against me anyway. She’s ordered them not to come to our aid, to let my, ah…’Foolish and wicked backsliding prove to all Ferelden that coddling mages will only lead to grief and the Maker’s displeasure.’ The Templars at Kinloch, Greagoir and his bunch, are mostly sympathetic, but they’re stuck at the Circle with those mages who don’t want to leave or who can’t. I could use a band of mercenaries who know how to deal with blood magic. And I could use a few more eyes protecting Dierdre. I’ve kept a small personal guard, but in order to keep as much of my own…freedom, I guess, I have kept it very small. And now that conceit looks to bite me in the arse, since I hesitate to have new recruits in charge of such a dear matter.” Alistair grimaced and Dierdre sat her own hand on his, with a fond smile. He glanced up at his queen and they traded a private look.

Aeryn considered the queen’s soft profile and then at Fenris and Varric, who nodded. Sebastian did as well, though somewhat reluctantly, she thought. “We’ll be happy to help, Alistair, if you could use our talents.” Her memory was jogged and she pulled a small packet from her jerkin. “Actually, I’ve already offered my services, as a messenger, at least. Warden Commander Caron sent you this.” 

Alistair took the envoy with a happy half smile and Dierdre pulled away, at his distraction. 

“I am…a little weary, my lord. I will leave you to your company. I am glad you are here, if only to relieve my king of some of his worry, Lady Hawke.” 

“The Commander sent you a package, as well, Your Majesty.” Aeryn had noted they hadn’t been given leave to address Dierdre informally and kept her tone polite, but warm. “I’m sorry I left it on the ship, it was a little awkward. I’ll bring it when we return.”

“Thank you, Lady Hawke, but there’s no hurry. I’m sure it’s just something Meridan sent for the baby.” Dierdre’s still-graceful curtsy acknowledged them all and the men, gentlemen all, stood as the queen withdrew.

Sebastian asked Alistair, who had gone back to perusing the letters, “Is the queen well?”

“Hmm? Oh, yeah. She’s fine. Apparently babies make you tired a lot in the first months. Poor girl’s past the sickness, any way.” Brought back to thoughts about his wife, Alistair grinned a little ruefully. “Damned useless feeling for a husband, too. Can’t do much but keep an eye on her. Make sure she’s got her watermelon pickles and salty crackers on hand.” 

Fenris’ lip curled. “Watermelon pickles? I have seen the fruit...but I did not realize they could be…pickled.” He looked disturbed at the idea and Alistair shrugged, chuckling.

“It’s the rind they pickle, not the melon. Some sort of Antivan delicacy, but she loves ‘em. For some reason especially in the wee hours of the morning.” 

Sebastian had to smother a laugh at Aeryn’s wrinkled nose. Fruit pickles in the middle of the night. Ick. 

They dispersed, promising to return in time for the nameday dinner, which Alistair had assured them was small and informal, to allow for Dierdre’s lack of interest in socializing late into the night. 

Varric paused as they passed a tavern. “Hawke. I think I won’t take the quarters at the palace.”

“Why, Varric?”

“Just a thought. If we’re spending the winter here and doing a few jobs, then we need an in on the local gossip and the underworld. If we’re all at the palace, we’re going to miss a lot. Servants don’t get everything.” 

“You’ve got your Guild ties, though.”

“Yeah, but…you know how it is. That shine of royal favor doesn’t always appeal to the folks with the best knowledge. I’ll hear what they want the King to hear. But if I separate out a little, I’ll get different contacts. I’ll still be at your beck and call, sweetheart, don’t worry.” 

Aeryn cocked her eyebrow. “I always worry. Here? Or at that brothel ‘Bela was going on about?”

“I’m thinking here, if there’s a decent room. Don’t want to go too far down the pole, or I’ll look out of favor and that’s not helpful either. Plus, it’ll give you a place to bolt, if the high life gets to be too much, just like the old days.”

“Not a bad idea. Alright, Varric. We’ll drop off your stuff if you want.”

“Sounds like a plan. Bianca and I will see you later.” He swung into the Gnawed Noble Tavern, with an extra swagger in his step, just to set the scene.

“I may…” Fenris started, but Aeryn fixed him with a sharp look. 

“Oh, no. Varric gets to set up on his own. Isabela’s going to want to stay with her ship, probably. But you aren’t abandoning me amongst the nobles, too.”

Sebastian nudged her. “I hadn’t thought to leave you, either.”

“Well, no of course not, but you’re going to be busy, it sounds like. Meetings and conferences and ambassadors. Someone has to help me with these jobs Alistair’s got.”

He blinked at her. “And you’ll be attending those as well, _leannan_.”

“Er…well. I hadn’t really…”

“Aeryn?” What was this, then?

“Oh, look. I believe I will look at the weapons that dwarf is displaying.” Fenris slipped away from the two lovers, who were gazing at each other with dismay.

Aeryn traced a pattern in the dust covering the pavers with her steel-toed boot. “I never went with you to your meetings, before, Sebastian.” It had occurred to her that she’d be needed before the actual fighting, but she’d hoped to keep it minimal, the occasional show of support at his side.

“No. But that was Kirkwall and you were Champion with other duties. Here…”

“Here I’ve been asked to aid the King. Love, you’re the one those people need to see. You’re the face of this. I’m just…”

“You are my intended and you need to be seen and acknowledged as such!” Her eyes went wide and Sebastian reviewed what he just said. Oh, Maker. “I mean…Aeryn. You know…I…want to marry you, _mo chridhe_.” He rubbed a hand through his hair. That was not the proposal he’d had in mind. Off the cuff, standing in a dusty street, in front of a tavern, of all things, like she was a common trull. Holy Beloved. “I want anyone we meet to know that as well.” He finished a little weakly.

Aeryn took a breath and waited for her heart to stop leaping in her chest. Oh. Okay. Still talking about the concept, not actually asking. She wasn’t sure if she was disappointed or not. “I know.” She gave him a gentle smile and Sebastian touched her dimpled cheek and ran his hand into the silken hair to rub behind her ear. She tipped her head into the caress. Sebastian’s bright eyes darkened and he stepped closer.

She hadn’t taken it as a proposal, then, he thought with relief. So, perhaps he could distract her from it, entirely.

“I want you with me.” Sebastian’s voice was velvety and enticing and it took all of Aeryn’s willpower not to kiss him in the street. Ferelden was more circumspect on those sorts of displays than Kirkwall had been.

There were curious eyes on them and Aeryn’s shoulders twitched. They were drawing attention. This really wasn’t the place to have this discussion, anyway. So, Aeryn patted his chest. “I know that, too. I can be. But I want to do the things Alistair’s asked of us, alright?” When Sebastian nodded, she grinned. “Well, then. Let’s get back to the ship. If we get the girls collected, we can be back and settled in an hour or so. We might even have time to look up the armorer and a tailor before dinner.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **_Author’s Notes:_** The Birth Rock is a concept taken from the Dragon Age Codex, with a quote adapted from the Chant. The description of the rock and its venue is mine, though.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author’s Note: Sorry for the delay, m’dears. I had a bit of a Hallowe’en catch-up to do on a costume. Next week’s chapter should be up on Monday, as usual. Thanks, as always, to mille libri for beta duties, though all mistakes are mine.

It hadn't taken long to organize the transfer of quarters from the _Siren's Call_ to the palace. At least not once the footmen arrived with their handcarts. Sebastian had to smile a little at Aeryn's disconcerted expression before she tucked it away to begin ordering the rearrangement of their trunks and packs. Her little household in Kirkwall was no great organization compared to the resources of a palace. 

That she'd considered herself spoiled by Bodahn and Orana boggled his mind, really. He could imagine spoiling her properly, though...if she'd ever allow it. 

Sebastian listened to Aeryn's low voice as she spoke to Macie. "We are guests of the king. There will be _no_ pick-pocketing or swiping on the palace grounds. It's disrespectful, got me?" 

"What's the point of being your apprentice if I don't learn..." 

"You'll learn when to steal and when not to. It's just as important. I'm not saying that everyone who walks into the palace is off-limits, I'm just saying you aren't to do anything that would insult King Alistair. Nobles are usually the best targets...but being noble doesn't mean you're rich. And it's best to keep your thefts to those that won't affect another unduly.” Aeryn smiled up at Sebastian and, slightly distracted, he was startled when her hand popped up, holding a feather from one of his pockets. 

“Aeryn!” He snagged it back, with a shake of his head as she smirked and Macie giggled. 

“Think about it...take something from someone who doesn't have much and it's like to be a treasure. They'll notice if it's gone. You want to stick to things that won't be noticed right away. A rich man usually can't recall if he had eight sovereigns in his pocket or ten. A poor one knows down to the last bent copper what he's got in his pockets. And he'll hunt you down for it." 

"I guess." Despite the bored expression, Sebastian could tell from the bright eyes that the girl was absorbing what Aeryn was saying. He was...uncomfortable, he supposed, that Aeryn was openly teaching Macie how to improve her thievery. But it had been his idea to bring the girl along. It shouldn't surprise him that Aeryn was passing along trade secrets. 

"Stick to us. If you can pick Isabela's pockets or Varric's, that's a pretty good clue that you're improving. You can't keep those things, though. And don't steal from Merrill at all. Or Fenris, he doesn't like it and it's not particularly safe to startle him. And sometimes he carries fish hooks." She gave sort of a reminiscing little smile 

Macie snorted and then tipped her head, curiously. "Can I tag you?" 

"Pup, if you can pick my pocket without me knowing, you're welcome to what you come by. Except the poison, give that back. It's not all labeled right. And don't put anything you pull from my pouches in your mouth to hide it. Isabela's, neither." 

"Why?" 

"Because we both coat our coin with spider venom." Sebastian coughed, covering a chuckle at Macie's comically startled face and Aeryn shot him a wink. "Teaches people not to doubt our word that our coin's good." 

They entered the bustling market square and the girl's eyes went wide. Aeryn hid her grin a little better than Sebastian managed, but it didn't matter. Macie was too busy ogling. "Is it always like this here?" Her head jerked around like a puppet on a string as she tried to see everything at once. 

"Oh, I doubt it. It's the queen's name day, so, I expect the revelry is mostly on account of that." They stopped for a moment to watch a group of Morris dancers doing a rhythmic step dance, bells jangling cheerfully on their legs. Merrill and Bethany drifted over to an open air stall to check out the staves, notably different in style than what was popular in the Free Marches. It had always boggled Aeryn that such magical tools were openly sold, because, really who needed them besides mages? But at least, now, it was a reasonable thing to do in Ferelden with the king's protection. Fenris followed Isabela into the tavern to deliver Varric's things and, like as not, to indulge in a bit of refreshment. 

Aeryn let her eyes drift over the square, as Sebastian was keeping his sharp gaze on Macie. A sign swaying in the breeze caught her notice, Master Wade's Emporium. Wade was the name of the armorer Meridan had called an artist. _Wonder if that's the fellow?_ Sebastian and Macie seemed caught up in the performance, so Aeryn took a moment to look. 

Slipping between wandering townsfolk and walking closer to the shop, she could catch the acrid scent of tanning and dye, the nose searing tang of hot metal. It did seem likely. She stepped up onto the wooden boardwalk. 

Sebastian felt more than saw Aeryn leave, the sudden absence like a cool chill at his side. He glanced up and saw her gleaming hair disappear into a shop. 

He caught a passing carter and purchased three strawberry ices in orange halves. Then, after corralling Macie, he delivered his treats to Merrill and Bethany who took them with delight. Sebastian waved off Macie's attempt to pay him back with an outward smile and inwardly considering. The afternoon had turned warm with that golden glow that an autumn sun could take on and the ices were welcome. Then he went after his errant lass with a promise to catch them up. 

He found her looking skeptically at a balding middle aged man who was complaining that the lack of flame stitching on the shoulders of her jerkin rendered the garment into obsolescence so dire that it made him faint to contemplate the results. “Aeryn, I swear I’m going to bell you. Could you not at least mention that you’re…”

Another man, taller and with a strident braying voice, welcomed him to the shop. "Welcome to Wade's Emporium..." But the balding man broke in excitedly. 

"Oh, please tell me _he's_ the one you came in looking to re-fit. That armor is to die for...meaning who ever made it should die. Horribly." Aeryn was left to watch in amusement as Wade circled Sebastian with a critical eye. "Herren, clear my schedule."

"Wade..."

Aeryn laid a hand on Herren's arm and smiled, charmingly. "I'm sure Prince Vael would be happy to mention the Emporium and Master Wade's skill whenever the armor was admired. And, of course, if there's a slight expediting fee, we would understand."

Herren's eyebrows slid up his forehead. "Prince...well, perhaps priorities _could_ be re-arranged."

Wielding his tape measure about Sebastian's inseam, Wade chattered on as Aeryn spoke quietly with Herren at the counter. "And you're an archer? Really, whoever designed this must have wanted you dead." 

"My father had it made for me. Modeled on the lines of our...the archer corps of Starkhaven." 

"Well, I can see where they were going...but, how impractical. No, now look...if I..." Master Wade rattled off a series of technical sounding terms, drawing alterations with a blue chalk pencil on the formerly pristine armor, while making Sebastian simulate his various draws and frequent movements. It probably wasn't particularly necessary for him to strip down to his smalls, but he blushed a little at Aeryn's poorly hidden smile as he followed Wade to the back of the shop.

If she wanted him to be properly kitted out, as she said, he'd do it. Despite whatever indignities might come along. Sebastian resisted the urge to smack the craftsman's hand as it drifted a little. But he'd repay the favor.

"Did I hear you say that Lady Hawke's armor was inadequate?" He couldn't help a wicked smile when Wade went off on a rant about wyvern hide and its irregularities. Sauce for the goose, then. It wasn't like he couldn't recite Aeryn's measurements quite easily.

They were both a little discombobulated when they exited the shop a half hour later, still tidying themselves and re-latching straps. Looking about, they spotted Isabela and Fenris as the two critically watched a display of knife throwing.

"You two look like you found a handy back alley." Isabela smirked at them, chortling when Sebastian answered. 

"No...just an armorer with roving hands."

Aeryn gave a prim little sniff, smoothing her sleeves. "Master Wade was a perfect gentleman."

"Maybe with you, _leannan_ ," Sebastian grumbled, and when Fenris gave his half smile, continued, "Yes, smile if you like. Aeryn promised to have you in there next, my friend."

"My armor is adequate." The smirk slipped to a frown as Fenris observed his old gear, eyeing down one arm, critically.

Aeryn flicked one of the spiked epaulets. "Your armor is ancient and the patches are showing. Coran didn't get that last upgrade soldered as cleanly as he could have."

The elf let his bangs cover his face. "It suits me, Hawke."

She touched the tip of her steel-toed boot to Fenris' foot, delicately and he shot her a glance from beneath his shock of white hair, with just a little smile. That was an old reminder of how far they’d come together. It had been the first way she’d shown him affection, when he couldn’t bear to be touched. In a low voice, Aeryn continued, "I didn't say it wasn't well made. I just think...since we're here for a bit, you might like to try something new. What do you think, 'Bela?"

Shrugging, the pirate answered, "So long as it's still lovely and form-fitting, what do I care?" Aeryn trod on her foot as she moved to lead them towards where Merrill and Macie were watching a puppet show on the corner. "Oh, I suppose change is nice, too, though." Isabela rubbed her bruised foot against the back of her calf with a glare at her friend, who blinked innocently.

As an apology, Aeryn mentioned, "Trips to the tailors and the seamstresses tomorrow." That sent a spark of interest into the pirate's amber eyes and Aeryn grinned. Isabela did love clothes. Usually Aeryn's, but maybe she could be persuaded to buy some of her own, this time.

"I will await Sebastian's results, I think," Fenris decided and Aeryn shrugged. He’d suit himself, of course. But she’d not let up. It was high time Fenris wore something besides the armor Danarius had made. He’d finally taken to dressing down in tunics and leggings during more casual times aboard ship and she didn’t intend to allow him to backslide. 

They were met at the palace gate by the young page, Harry, who had attended them earlier. Brendan had arranged for Harry to run their errands and messages. “To generally be at your service, m’lady,” he explained to Aeryn, studiously ignoring Macie’s attempts to draw the older boy’s attentions. “Except for mornings when I have study hall.”

The boy led them to the western third floor and the companions found their gear already unpacked and ready in the various rooms. There was a large study lined with bookshelves and warmed by an enormous fireplace that could serve as a gathering area just off the landing from the stairwell leading down to the main hall. It was comfortably furnished, suiting the more casual company of rogues, mages and warriors that would use it than the general run of nobles. Or perhaps, that’s just how most of the areas of the Fereldan palace were furnished, Sebastian wondered. None of the rooms in his father’s palace would have been allowed to be quite so…casual. The tapestries hung to discourage the chill were of various hunting scenes and one of an archer kneeling beside a wounded griffon that made Sebastian smile nostalgically. It was a scene often depicted in Starkhaven; one of their archers, Connaut, who legendarily had joined the Grey Wardens that fought the third Blight. 

Merrill seemed caught by the scene outside the broad sills of the windows. Most of the glass was gaily colored, to lend cheerfulness to the general grey days of long winters, but one span of clear beveled glass looked out over the aforementioned rose gardens. 

Aeryn leaned over her shoulder. “What do you see, Kitten?”

“I…I’m not sure?” Her long slender finger, with its painted nail, traced the pattern of the rosebeds out on the glass. Two sets of four arching rows, crossing in the middle before a central tree. “It…looks like a Dalish pattern. But why would it be? I think I’m maybe just…missing them.” She peered up at Aeryn out of the corner of her eye as the rogue tilted her head to see if she saw the same thing.

Shrugging, Aeryn shook her head. “I don’t know, Merrill. I never got as familiar with Dalish customs as I meant to.”

“Can we go down, do you think?”

“I think King Alistair gave us permission to roam the whole place, grounds included. I suppose if the gate’s open, there’s no problem.” 

“Would you come, too?”

“I can. We’ve a few hours yet before the dinner we’ve been invited to. Anyone else?”

Sebastian was amenable to strolling in a rose garden with Aeryn, so he came. Isabela and Fenris claimed to have other plans, but Bethany and Macie tagged along.

Harry, interrupted from the book he’d brought to occupy himself at his post, directed them to the entrance of the garden. “Just past the practice rings in the courtyard is the inner gate. There’s another outside, just past Andraste’s Rock, open to the public some days as it’s a tribute to the Hero and the folk who died fighting the Blight.”

“Oh.” Merrill’s eyes went soft and she ran, fleet-footed, down the staircase.

“Merrill, wait!” They jogged to catch up.

 

As they crossed the courtyard, they interrupted Alistair in the middle of his practice drills. The king, in full armor and sweating, dragged a linen towel across his face and hailed them as he sheathed his sword. “Leaving already, Hawke? Doesn’t say much for my hospitality!”

“No, just doing a bit of reconnaissance, getting a feel for the territory. Thought we’d start with the garden.” She smiled up at Sebastian, who took her hand. This would be a first for them, a quiet stroll in a garden. 

Varric would be so pleased. “It’s sodding hard to keep telling stories about your romantic walks amongst the dying shades and corpses, you know, Hawke. People will get the wrong idea about you,” he’d grumbled once, not long ago.

“The rose garden? Mind if I come along? There are a couple of small monuments that won’t be obvious if you aren’t looking.” The king’s face was open, but his eyes were serious and Aeryn smiled at him, happy to include him.

“More the merrier, I’m sure.” It gave her another chance to observe Alistair, too. Get to know him without being too obvious. A guard followed them, discreetly, but at a glance from Alistair, he turned and stood at the gate to await the king’s return.

He moved like a warrior, still, evidence that the past years had not really allowed him to set his sword down too often. The plate had to be heavy, but he didn’t clank and clang. Somewhere along the line, he’d managed to learn how to carry it as quietly as possible. The Hero and two of her companions had been rogues. Perhaps, that explained it, then. Aeryn had always complained about Aveline’s plate on quiet runs. 

Just past the Birth Rock shrine, a wooded glade separated the two open areas and a small meadow opened into the rose garden that lay beneath their windows. There were roses in beds laid in bow-like arcs. A few of the bushes, near the stone walls and right around the center, were still braving the chill and blooming in glorious crimson. And at the heart of the garden, a rowan tree bearing a full flush of orange berries on its spreading branches. The berries had drawn in the birds that would linger here on the coast during the winter, redbirds and sparrows and chickadees. 

There were a few carved stones placed here and there along the winding path. In full summer leaf, the bushes and flowering plants would have obscured them, but the fading foliage didn’t really hide them away. Alistair pointed them out, anyway, to Aeryn and Sebastian, strolling hand in hand next to him. The crushed rosy stone that made the path scrunched under their feet and they could hear birds and squirrels, all used to human company, continuing on in their chatter and busy work. Macie was touching plants as she walked, trailing a long stem of plantain, letting the different foliage leave their dusty green scents on her skin. Bethany refrained from telling her the various names, which Aeryn thought was best. The girl really hadn’t shown any interest in herblore, which didn’t bode well for any aptitude in poison.

They paused, finally, on the mossy path circling the tree. There was a low seat made of grey stone with a pale green veining, simple in line and carving, and it was here that the arching beds they saw from above were planted.

Merrill was trailing them, looking everywhere at once, following the line of the beds and finally kneeling at the base of the rowan to touch the bark reverently. Aeryn watched her, curiously. Merrill liked nature, but she wasn't a particularly...frolicky...elf. 

Then, in a flurry of scarf and limbs, the blood mage flung her arms around a very startled king's neck. 

"Oouf. Ah. Hello, there." 

"She's here, isn't she?" Merrill's hazel eyes were huge and damp as she looked up into Alistair's confused face. 

He blinked his own hazel eyes back at her, and just a touch of color crept over his cheekbones. "Oh. Well, um." A sheepish look warred with defiance. "Yes. They were going to burn her...carry her ashes to lay at Weisshaupt. It wasn't...We switched her and buried Lyna here. She...told me once, that's what the Dalish did. I couldn't get her to the forest, but...there was this grove, here, anyway. And I planted the rowan. The...garden came later. When I had a chance." The confession came haltingly as Alistair patted Merrill's back awkwardly with a gauntleted hand and sent Aeryn a pleading look as the elf cuddled him. Biting her lip, Aeryn drew her slim friend away. He looked bereft for just a second. "It...it _was_ right, wasn't it?" 

Merrill nodded, sniffling. "It's perfect. It's beautiful. Oh, thank you." 

Alistair ran a hand over his cropped hair and down his face, and then looked up, composed and well-humored again. "Well. Nicer in summer when it's all in bloom. Though there's almost always roses here. Wynne says the stone wall keeps it warmer." 

"Would you mind...oh, could I...there are a few things I could plant...that would make it..." Merrill spoke a few words in Elvish and then, "More right...I mean? Do you mind?" 

"In the winter?" 

"Not quite winter, yet. And they'll be just right to move now. I can find them, I think, Hawke, if you'll come?" 

Aeryn nodded. "If it's alright with Alistair, Merrill. I'll help, of course." 

Alistair looked out over the garden. Something quietly pained crossed his face and then he turned back to them. "Yes. Do...as you think is right, Merrill. You'd know, I guess. And, this was never meant to be...It should be as right as it can be." He bowed slightly. "I should...I should go. Excuse me, please." They watched the king stride quickly across the garden, head bowed. But he straightened and set his shoulders before he turned back down the allee to where the attendant manning the door could see him. 

Aeryn watched him, an ache in her heart, and when Sebastian tugged her back against his tall, lean frame she went willingly, wanting to feel him alive and vital against her.

He wrapped his arms around her waist and kissed the top of her hair. “He grieves her, still, I think.” His voice rumbled in her ear. 

“I think you’re right.” Aeryn turned in his arms. “If it were me…left behind…I would, till...” _Always. Forever. Until there was nothing left of me_. And she wanted to make him promise, suddenly, but there were no promises that could account for ill-chance. Her fingers curled around the edges of his jerkin, not quite clinging. 

Sebastian looked down, the blue blazing with emotion. “As would I, à ruin. Never doubt it.” He bent his head to kiss her, hoping to chase away the sudden fear that crossed both of them. 

_Rather awkward to think I considered trysting in a graveyard, though_. Aeryn pulled away slightly. "On the off chance, though that you do outlive me..."

"Aeryn..." Holy Beloved, he didn't want to think about such a thing.

"No, I just...please don't bury me under your bedroom window. It can't be healthy."

What? Sebastian saw the hint of sparkle in her eye and the wry little twist to her mouth and laughed, helplessly. "That is _terrible_. Maker forgive you."

"I suppose He might if you have anything to say about it." She grinned, making light of it, but as Aeryn laid her forehead against his chest and he kissed the back of her head he wondered if some part of her meant exactly that.

 

>>>\---- >  
A maid had come and collected their finery, earlier, and when they returned to quarters, it was all laid out in their rooms, cleaned and pressed. A steaming bath waited in each dressing room as well and Aeryn stopped to wonder how much work that had involved. 

“I dinna care, myself. I’ll be glad to bathe without the saltwater stinging, thank you,” Sebastian had replied. 

“Well, there is that,” she agreed and then had to chivvy him to his own bath so that she could bathe for once without most of the water ending up on the floor. The maids had even found her almond soap in her trunk, Aeryn noted. She hoped they’d been careful in what they touched. Her trunks often held surprises for the unsuspecting.

After she’d bathed and, after two attempts, seen Macie as clean as the girl would stand, Aeryn set up a small test, with three of the less elaborately locked trunks placed in front of the fire while their hair dried and they had a small tea. 

Sebastian grinned, recalling. He’d gotten the same run through, when he’d first joined up. He’d been truly dismayed (and then ashamed of his dismay) that his skills had decayed so desperately in his time as a priest, when once he'd prided himself on the fact that no lock in his father's keep was capable of keeping him out. Or in. It had taken him three tries to get the most complicated, with Aeryn sitting on the chaise in her study, one eyebrow arched incredulously, as Varric and Isabela snickered next to her.

In his own defense, his reward hadn’t been dessert, either. 

Macie got to the lemon tarts in the third trunk with quick ease. Aeryn, thankful to have finally found something Macie had an aptitude for, allowed her one before dinner, with a promise of the other two after. 

Harry, who had been watching the proceedings with a sharp eye from his corner, spoke up then. “If she is finished with her…training, Lady Hawke, I could show Macie to the areas the other children of the palace gather. Unless you have further need of me before dinner?” 

“Fine by me,” Aeryn agreed. “If you’d like, pup.”

Macie nodded from where she was sprawled on the hearth rug. “Yeah, I guess.”

“Remember what I told you about respecting our host?”

“Yeah.” Aeryn looked evenly at her until the girl bowed neatly and clarified. ”Yes, ser.”

“Alright then. Have fun.”

Aeryn was pleased to see that Macie was generous…or shrewd…enough to share the tart with the page and they were munching companionably as they left.

Sebastian picked up his cup and moved from the armchair to drop to the floor at Aeryn’s feet. He laid his head against her knee and she speared her fingers into his hair, letting the drying strands slide through. He closed his eyes and enjoyed the caress. “She seems to be settling, don’t you think?”

“We’ll see. I’m glad to know there are other children in the palace. I was wondering what she was going to do for mates…not much fun to be cooped up with grown-ups the live long day.”

“Hard on the adults, too.” Aeryn had slipped into one of her wrapped woolen housedresses and it left her knees bare. He pressed a kiss to the joint and was rewarded with a pleased hum. 

Considering what those adults could teach her, Macie's better off picking locks than pockets, anyway, Sebastian thought and then caught himself, realizing what he'd just done. He chuckled, a little ruefully, and Aeryn smiled at the reluctant, but warm sound.

"What were you thinking?"

"Oh, just that I'm a bit of a hypocrite."

Her slim fingers paused in their finger combing. "That's a rather harsh thing to say. Are you?"

"That I'd rather see her pick locks than pockets?" Sebastian shook his head. "Aye, a wee bit. When did you learn to do it?" He'd always wondered.

She was quiet a moment and he turned, concerned that he'd hurt her. There was a look of consternation on her face.

"Well, I was always something of a magpie, you know. I...don't know, really?" Aeryn cast back and couldn't recall. She'd just always...done it. "I just wanted to know what everyone was carrying in their pockets. It wasn't until I was a fair bit older, twelve or so, that I ever went for coin. When was your first lock, then?"

He chuckled again. "My bedroom door, when I was eight."

"Oh." A flash of sorrow in her eyes had him pressing another kiss to her knee, a little higher than before.

None of that, now. "And it's a skill that served me well, there after."

"You do have the nimblest fingers of any man I ever met." This was said with a happy little sigh and he laughed outright. Sebastian turned his head to look up at her and Aeryn felt a flutter of desire well up at the burning intent in his gaze. “I need to work on my daggers.” She had _meant_ to be productive while they waited for dinner.

“Do you now?” 

“All that salt water, ah…wasn’t good for them.”

“Is that so?”

“Sebastian…” Slightly breathless and Maker, he _did_ love to hear his name on those lips.

“Yes, _leannan_?”

“Our room has a bolt on the door, you know.”

He glanced up from where his hands had been sliding up along her firm, strong thighs under the slitted sides of her skirt. Her eyes were smoky and heated and her mouth was curved up in her crooked smile. “And that’s true. Shall we…”

She slid away from him and threw him a laughing smile over her shoulder. “I don’t know…that’s a pretty big bed. I might actually win a game of keep away, here.” 

“Never.” And he was smiling, too, when she threw the bolt behind them.

They actually managed to get dressed an hour or so later.

Aeryn allowed one of the maids to help her with her hair. It was longer now than it had been for years and even when it had been long before, Aeryn had never done more than weave it into plain braids or pull it back severely into a ponytail. She needed to learn a few tricks. The young woman looked at her critically for a few minutes and then set her fingers to work, braiding back the bangs and getting the waving hair to curl sweetly around her ears. It was, Aeryn had to admit, quite attractive. A few adjustments, and the new look would be suitable for fighting, too. She’d been having trouble keeping her bangs pinned away from her face, but the braid could be tightened enough to fix that. 

She’d opted for another of the laced velvet waists and fitted trousers, in deep green. Alistair had said informal, and her maid had assured her that trousers, while unusual, wouldn’t stand out too much. Aeryn had no trouble being unusual, but she didn’t want to be outré, either. Plus, she’d seen that Sebastian had laid out his russet doublet and the green would show well, beside it.

Adjusting the lay of the two small knives she carried in specially embroidered sheaths tucked along her ribcage, she came out of the dressing room. Sebastian had just finished lacing up his dress boots and had to catch his breath. He’d not seen her in green before. 

"How do I look?" 

He set his hand to his chin to consider a moment as she posed, showing off the new hairstyle with an upraised chin. "Have you any idea how beautiful you are, _mo chridhe_?" 

Smirking, she called him out, "Flatterer." 

"Not at all, for flattery is a lie and a sin. And when I tell you that your skin is like white silk, that your lips are curved like the line of my bow, that your hair is a crown of dark flame and the perfect foil to all your pale beauty, that your eyes put all the stars of the heavens to shame, I speak only the Maker's own truth. You are _so_ beautiful, my Aeryn." 

Sebastian stalked towards her as he spoke, his voice sinking low in his chest and smoothing over her like rough velvet. Aeryn swayed into him as he drew near. The truth was she had no real doubt of her own appeal. But, somehow, hearing it from him in that rolling brogue with all the love in his gaze was far better than any proof her mirror gave her.

He did like the new hairstyle, Sebastian thought, though the neatness of the braid made him long to tug it free and let the crimson bangs spill. Ah, but he had years of training in resisting temptations behind him.

And he only had to last out the evening, thank the Maker.

Those eyes of hers were glowing, now, like molten silver. Sebastian couldn't resist bending to kiss her, the need to taste her setting such a rushing beat in his ears he almost didn't hear her whispered thanks before he nudged apart her lips to claim their sweetness. Their tongues slid together, tantalizingly stroking.

Rapping on the door signaled the arrival of Macie, looking pink cheeked after her freetime. And she agreed readily enough to staying behind. Especially once Isabela had offered to stay with her and Merrill. 

"I had more than my share of noble parties long ago, thank you. I'd rather teach the kid how to cheat at cards." Aeryn grinned at Macie’s look of delight. She hoped her…apprentice, fine. Yes, that’s clearly what she was, now. Although maybe less just Aeryn’s than all of theirs. Anyway, hopefully the lesson on sneaking and breaking in that Aeryn had planned for the morning would go over well. She wanted someone small who could get into the little crevices that even Aeryn couldn’t hide in anymore to help her scan out the palace’s hiding places. 

Fenris had pulled out the formal wear he'd been forced to wear to Aeryn's official Champion's recognition ball, years before. The black jaquard and leather doublet and trousers suited him, but it always surprised Sebastian to realize again that the lyrium seemed to know it was being hidden. It glowed, faintly, even under the leather. 

"I will stay as well, if..."

Aeryn interrupted, with a soft note of concern. "Stay behind if you like, Fenris." She knew that the increased lyrium display would wear on him after too long, giving him a headache and shortening his already short temper. "I had hoped to have you scope out the security with me, but until we find you something more comfortable..."

He shook his head. "No, if you need me, I will come. I can...it's fine, Hawke."

"Alright." She'd have to keep an eye on him.

The dinner wasn't what Aeryn would call small and informal. She was introduced to dozens of people; nobles, dignitaries, and hangers-on. But it was _how_ she was introduced that surprised her most. 

"My long lost cousins. Great great grandfather Merrin married an Amell." Alistair beamed at her. "Knew those genealogists would come in useful someday."

Sebastian looked almost as happy about it as Alistair. "It's a nice tie, Aeryn. Starkhaven...likes titles. And kin-claim to a king, no matter how distant...well, let’s just say it'll smooth a few paths for us, later, since Kirkwall is shut to us now."

"I see." 

"Cousins to the king." Bethany looked quite perky about the news. "What do you think mother would have to say?"

"I...guess she'd be glad of it." Nobility _had_ made Leandra's life easier. Better. And if Aeryn had resented how easily her mother had seemed to move on, well, that was just Aeryn’s own problem, wasn’t it? 

Bethany squeezed her sister’s hand and soon found herself quite the center of attention. After all, an unattached cousin to the king had more potential than Aeryn, who was obviously Sebastian's lady.

After Bethany had been whirled around the room on an introductory front by Dierdre, she returned to Aeryn's side to eat, some what breathless and inclined to be a little sarcastic. "I do wonder if they'd be as friendly if they knew..." Bethany wiggled her fingers suggesting magic.

"Probably not, but they don't know about my proclivities, either. It'll work out, Beth. At least we aren't surrounded by Templars."

"True." But sadness traced across Bethany's features. Cullen still lingered on her thoughts, then, Aeryn realized. One Templar she wouldn’t mind seeing. 

"Oh, Beth. I'm sorry, little sister."

Beth waved her off. "No. No...it’s just...I just realized I hadn't thought at all about him tonight. Not even when...I hadn't thought it was possible. To _not_ be thinking of him, I mean." Her brown eyes were soft and pensive. "What does that mean, Aeryn?"

"You can't grieve forever, Beth. It isn't healthy. He's living his life, right? Doing well, even. I don't think he'd want you to pine so much that you couldn't live, too."

"Wouldn't you?" Those too-seeing eyes cut over to Sebastian who was listening intently to something Alistair was saying.

"I..." Aeryn shook her head. "I'm not you, little sister. You know I deal...poorly...with..." Taking a sip of her cider, a sparkling variety she'd heard of but never tasted, she shrugged.

"Loss." It was true, Bethany knew well enough. 

Aeryn shot her sister a wry grin. "Don't take my path, anyway. Come on, let's critique the clothes. Merrill and Isabela will want to hear. And surely puce isn't really as popular as it seems to be. Tell me I'm imagining it, pretty please." 

The dinner moved on into small entertaining acts and Bethany excused herself after the Nevarran acrobats, still too quiet. Aeryn watched her go, worried, only to be distracted when Fenris came to stand by her, looking a little haggard and grim.

"There are not enough guards. If there was a concerted attack, this would be too vulnerable a place."

She snagged a cup of wine from a passing servant and set it in his hand. "Well, it’s a fine line to draw. I imagine Alistair doesn't want to feel smothered."

"Perhaps not. But he will regret it if something happens. We can be useful, here." Fenris took a cautious sip of the wine and raised his eyebrow, appreciatively.

"I think so. Varric?" The dwarf had made another round, picking up on gossip.

"I've got an introduction to the Guildmaster tomorrow. We'll find out if there's any official hit out." He shrugged and then with a gleam in his eyes that reminded her of fun nights in Kirkwall, added, "This isn't a bad gig, Hawke. We're going to make some good connections. Choir Boy...you better take advantage of this or I'm gonna regret taking you under my wing."

Sebastian grinned. "Is that what you call it? I thought it was hazing you were doing."

"Boy, if you had been hazed, you'd have woken up in your skin in the parlor of the Rose with a tattoo on your ass that read "Property of the Maker. Return to sender."

"Oh, I might have enjoyed that!" Aeryn grinned when Sebastian gave a wicked smirk and a slight bow.

"And so too would the ladies and gents of the Rose. I'd have given good measure, even unconscious."

Varric's rumbling laugh made everyone around them ask to be let in on the joke, which did make Sebastian blush. He wasn’t quite up to keeping up with Varric’s banter outside of their little group.

Turning away from the conversation a moment, Aeryn cast her eyes over the crowded room. There was a couple in the darker corner, trysting. And a few steps away, an older woman who was clearly looking for one of the young dalliers. 

A servant passed delivered a tray holding delicate glass cups of elderflower liqueur to an older group and Aeryn's gaze slipped over them.

Only to come back, when something nagged at her. Something setting off that little pestering worry at the base of her spine, setting the hairs on the back of her neck on end. She'd seen...what? She never could quite explain it, how she picked up on danger. Mainly because the truth was she'd seen something that reminded her of herself. A wolf in the fold, pretending to be a sheep.

Something about the way the one servant moved. All of Alistair's household staff was quiet and unassuming, a sign of Dierdre's management to keep them out of the way of her husband, but _that_ woman moved just a little too smoothly and with too much purpose. 

Varric coughed at her elbow. "Hawke." 

"Yeah, I see her." Aeryn's voice had dropped from the cultured murmur she'd been using to her sharper hunting tone and Sebastian looked up. 

"What is it?" 

Aeryn set orders as she leaned softly against Sebastian to cover her adjustments, loosening the ribbons on her sleeves to give herself better range of movement. "Fenris, get between the queen and the rest of the room. Varric, cover Alistair. Sebastian, sweep the room, anyone here look...wrong?" 

Frowning, he used his height to observe the room and... "There, the man with the pale blue sleeves. No' a servant nor a noble." Fenris tracked on the man slinking around the edge. 

Aeryn slipped away from them, letting Varric explain quietly behind her. Sebastian watched as Aeryn’s graceful form swayed, and she stopped to pick up a small plate of delicacies before gliding unobtrusively to the other side of the room. In another few steps, she could intercept the servant and check her out…no, too late. 

The servant's hand flashed and Aeryn tossed the plate up to intercept a throwing knife. A handful of shaved ice from a platter of spiced shrimp served to distract and Aeryn moved in to break the woman's wrist against a stone column. Another knife flicked out in the off hand and nicked Aeryn’s palm. Aeryn stopped playing and smashed her forehead into the other woman's face, breaking the nose and disarming her. Shrieking, the assassin dropped the knife to cover her face. Aeryn jerked the assassin across her hip, flipping her and finally landing with Aeryn's knee in her chest and her own knife in her throat. 

Sebastian watched her with fond appreciation for the smoothness of her movement, efficient and precise. She really was exquisite in her art. A huntress in her prime. 

Ignoring the shouts from the crowd, Aeryn flicked her eyes up to Alistair, who had drawn his blade and shifted Dierdre behind him. 

Fenris had moved in a blaze of lyrium as Aeryn had stopped the first knife, and was now holding the struggling man Sebastian had picked out, one lean, branded arm around the man’s broad neck. 

Sebastian and Varric stepped out of the way, so that the king could see his attackers.

"Your Majesty, shall we dispatch these villains for you?" Aeryn's eyes were pale and impersonal as moonstones on the king. She blinked as a slight disorientation slid over her, but it passed quickly as Alistair stalked over and set his sword at the woman's gut. Pushing away with a slight extra shove to the assassin’s ribcage, Aeryn rose to her feet and allowed the king room to stand over the prostrate assassin.

"You will tell me why." No trace of the merry young king now. He was cold and terrible in anger, giving all gathered a glimpse of the Warden who had crossed Ferelden with the Hero. This, as much as his popularity with the common folk, was why the country had come together so quickly after the Blight, Sebastian thought. It was something to consider. 

"Bastard! Imposter! You had the true queen murdered and now you attempt to set your cuckolding wife's bastard on the throne." From Fenris' grasp, the man grunted his agreement and Fenris' grasp tightened, choking him off.

She looked up at Aeryn, then. "You...you’re not from here…you aren't one of them. Our true queen, m'lady. Anora, daughter of our true hero, who those ...Maker forsaken wardens...dragged through the mud, dared to call traitor…"

Sebastian saw Aeryn's lip curl and knew what was coming. That icy, cruel side of her. He stepped closer to her, offering her his presence.

"Let me stop you, there. I am not one to defend Loghain to, bitch. I, who stood at Ostagar, bleeding and nearly dying alongside hundreds. I, who saw Loghain turn tail and let his King be viciously slain, let his countrymen fall to the filth and beg and die and rot..." Aeryn had to stop and regain control of herself. The knife was clenched in her hand and it nearly trembled.

"You will find no sympathy from me. Your Majesty..." She stopped again, realizing she had been about to beg permission to kill like a leashed hound. Aeryn beat back the urge with reasonable success. What had her so short? There was another small wave of dizziness and she realized. Void. Poison. Nothing too lethal, considering all the nasty things she'd exposed herself to, but she'd have to be mindful till it wore off. Angling herself so that she'd be unseen by the larger crowd and her companions, she drew the king's eye and mouthed, "poison." Wiggling the knife, to indicate it. 

Alistair went very still and the assassin at his sword point blanched.

But he kept his voice even, with every measure of control he had. "You'll get no pardon from me, either, mistaken as you are.” Alistair glanced around at the gathered court. "Does anyone here deny my right to kill them?"

No one spoke for a minute until the lady Aeryn had been introduced to as Bann Alfstana sighed. "Well, don't do it _here_ , Your Majesty. It would ruin the floor. Think of your poor housekeeper." Aeryn's lips curved just a little. She had _missed_ Ferelden.

Sebastian was a bit shocked, he had to admit. But had it been his court, Aeryn’s celebration marred by such an attempt? He wasn’t sure. He would have to think about such things, soon. 

"Alistair..." Dierdre's voice was soft. Alistair glanced up and at the look on her face, immediately sheathed his sword and stepped to her side, wrapping a strong arm around her thickening waist. Dierdre didn't quite sag against him, but her color was off, Aeryn noted worriedly.

The king escorted his queen to the door, throwing over his shoulder. "Take that trash to Drakon. They'll hang in the morning." The three attending guards, embarrassed by their lack of participation in the fight, gathered up the bleeding attackers and marched them away.

Aeryn felt a little unsteady and shook herself, hoping to fend off the adrenaline and the toxin as Sebastian stepped to the couple’s side, already.

In a low voice, he asked Alistair, "Is there a healer on hand or should we send for Bethany?"

"Oh, I'm fine...just a bit too much excitement is all," Dierdre demurred. 

But Alistair nodded. "Send her over, in case. There's a healer at the Chantry, but she might be out when the messenger gets there."

 

Aeryn thought the party would end, but most lingered. "Jackals after the gossip," Fenris informed her caustically. 

That did seem to be why everyone stood about. The seneschal had the tables rearranged and decks of cards and other amusements soon had the guests happily situated. But almost all tried to draw Aeryn aside, applauding her quick intervention. She soon had a glass in her hand and if she downed it rather too quickly, it was refilled just as fast.

The attention was...not unpleasant, though it felt unnatural. Aeryn had grown used to nobles smiling at her face and sniping behind her back, but the ones who spoke to her seemed sincere. Still, she was relieved when Sebastian reappeared and she could use his larger presence to shield herself a little. Fenris had joined a card game, the traitor. 

And Varric...oh, Maker. He was back to his tales. "Oh, you want to hear about the Arishok? That, my friend, is one for the ages, no shit, you should have seen her..." He had a crowd in minutes.

Sebastian watched her, a little concerned. Usually after a fight, Aeryn was bursting with energy and ready to be a bit social. But she had her cool, bland mask on and she was holding herself a bit aloof, despite the attention. When she allowed him to hover, it worried him further, and he slid his hand from her arm to her waist, protectively.

After a bit, Alistair returned to assure everyone of Dierdre's wellbeing and a spread of sweets and coffee was carted in. "She's her usual sparkling self. Back to her bustle tomorrow, don't doubt it!" And the relieved laughter in the room made Aeryn reconsider Fenris' comment about jackals. Dierdre was popular, and they were worried. 

The king swept over and, with a grin, swept her into a bear-hug. "Excuse me, Vael! Had to thank her properly." Aeryn's face went pink as the room buzzed with amusement. "Really. I knew I did the right thing having you stay!" He excused himself again and the crowd thinned to just the few dignitaries and visitors staying at the palace within half a mark.

Bann Alfstana slapped Aeryn across the shoulder, one last time. "It was neatly done! I'm glad to see Alistair finally found himself another protector as sneaky as..." She stopped suddenly, reconsidering her words. "Well, you'll do. I hope he convinces you to stay on." 

"I'm sorry, what?" 

But the bann excused herself, hurriedly, and headed for the door.

Rubbing at the incipient headache at her temple, Aeryn looked up at Sebastian who had his warm hand securely in the small of her back. "I think we can leave now."

"If you'd like, Aeryn."

They got to the landing, out of the sight of curious eyes, and Aeryn leaned into him, her head just at his shoulder. "It is lovely that you're so tall." He'd been like a bulwark between her and the crush.

Sebastian couldn't help a pleased smile and wondered if she realized she'd just repeated the first compliment she'd ever given him, outside of her strategic approval of his aim. They had been out on the Wounded Coast, following yet another rumor of Tal Vashoth, and between Aeryn, Varric, Merrill, and Fenris, who was tall for an elf, they'd not been able to look too far ahead without giving away their position. He'd received a delighted smile when he spotted their prey, half a mile away over several boulders. She'd said it just that way, with fondness and admiration. And for the first time in years, he'd been glad of it. It had never sat well with his father or brothers once he'd hit sixteen and been the tallest in the keep. "You remind him too much of his father," one visiting noblewoman had told Sebastian when he'd been ignored, again, and she'd taken advantage of his willingness to be distracted. 

And no one ever mentioned physical attributes in the Chantry. Or so he had discovered after one embarrassing instance when he'd admired a sister's graceful movement in placing candles. Oh, once, Sebastian had been given endless compliments on his eyes, his elegant manners, even his mouth on several memorable occasions. He'd forgotten what it felt like, though, until Aeryn had come into his life.

"Lovely and tall." She stroked his cheek and stretched up to kiss him, just brushing his jaw. "Ah, missed." 

Aeryn couldn’t have drunk enough to make her unsteady, but he took the excuse to draw her closer. "You're a wee bit tipsy, _à ruin_." He smiled into her hair.

"Possibly. But don't change the subject."

"The subject being I'm tall and, ah, lovely?"

Aeryn tipped her head, enjoying the flush of color running up his neck. "Well...handsome, just this side of pretty."

Sebastian raised his eyebrows. "Pretty, is it?"

"Hmmm."

"Not entirely sure how I feel about that."

"Well, so long as I know how _I_ feel. Such a temptation you must have been as a youth, my lad. That nose of yours sends you solidly on the side of masculine beauty, now, though, I promise."

"And do I not tempt you now, broken nose and all?" Sebastian angled his gaze through his lashes. Ah, he was a charmer, her rogue prince. The Maker alone knew how anyone had ever resisted him. 

Aeryn’s low chuckle caught in his chest like a lure, reeling him in. "Oh, Sebastian. If you only knew, my love." She languidly slid one finger down the bridge of said nose. “I’m terribly fond of it. Very rakish, even makes you look a bit dangerous. It was the third thing I noted...what sort of priest had any right to look that dashing?" 

Sebastian caught her hand and pressed a kiss to her fingertip. Dangerous and dashing, was it, then? He'd have to remember to say a prayer for the barman who had cracked him across the face with a pitcher. Apparently the Maker did have a reason for all things.

She frowned, suddenly distracted from their teasing play. "Oh, sodding _Void_."

"What?"

"I had empty pockets when I came down." She pulled out a small black runestone with a silver rune carved into it. "Maker...where did I...?"

"Dinna blame the Maker for those light fingers of yours." Sebastian shook his head and plucked the stone from her hand. He’d seen this somewhere in the last few hours…but where, then? And she surely hadn't drunk enough to let her fingers stray in a room full of nobles? After what she’d told Macie?

"I'll face my own music, thank you." She took it back, palming it. "I'll just tell the steward I found it on the floor."

Shaking his head, Sebastian remonstrated with her. “I’m not sure that counts as facing the music, _mo chridhe_ , unless you actually admit to your thieving ways.”

"Hmph. So long as it gets back to whoever was so careless as to lose it." Aeryn stumbled again and Sebastian caught her.

"Aeryn?!"

A deep breath cleared her muzzy head again. He was worried now, though, so she had better own up. Sighing, she said, "M’alright. The liquor must have reacted badly with the poison."

Shock widened his eyes. "Poi...Aeryn, _what_ poison?"

She sent him a crooked smile. "On the knife. I'm fine, love. Just need a bit of a restorative and a nap. My toes are a little numb. It'll wear off soon. I'm mostly inured to the ones I use and this was just…oh, spider venom and woundingwort, mixed, if I was to guess. Baby stuff." Lethal enough, though, to someone who hadn’t been playing with poison since she was a child.

Sebastian had gone white to his lips. He was going to...honestly, he wanted to shake her. She took so little care of herself. What could he do? If there was going to be a more dire reaction, she’d have already collapsed, but…"D'ya think your sister is still wi' the queen?"

"I'm alright. Hey!" He'd swept her up and was walking her towards the stairs. "Sebastian! I'm fine!" She thumped him on the shoulder, ineffectually since all she got was an arrogant look.

"Dinna push me, Aeryn. You should ha' _said_ something." Sebastian tightened his arms around her and headed for the upper landing. He'd almost stayed to the card game. She could have stumbled on the stairs or...he forced the could-have-beens aside and simply prayed for patience.

Aeryn laid her head to his shoulder, in resignation. She _was_ off-balance. Might as well enjoy the ride, she supposed. And take the comfort.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author’s Note: 
> 
> There is art for Shelter and Steal Away Home, now! *cuehappyfangirlsqueeingfromyourauthor*
> 
> Elyssa Wecera, known around ff.net as fruitsexual, did a saucy, daggery, Aeryn that I’ve been using as my avatar here and as a cover for Tales from the Shelterverse. See it here: http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m79uwymMJT1rbvs8vo1_1280.jpg
> 
> Lenacast over at deviantart has done a lovely sketch of Sebastian and Aeryn, called Mo Chridhe. It is very NSFW, but if you’re of age, go tell her how awesome she is!
> 
> Ladies, I’m in awe. Thanks!


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Author’s Note: Sorry for the skipped week, dear readers. Life occasionally wins out over fiction. I hope you saw the Leandra pov I posted under Tales from the Shelterverse. Thanks to mille libri for beta work, though all mistakes are mine!_
> 
> _Bioware owns all, I’m just happy to play in the sandbox!_

Aeryn ran through two sets of her stretches the next morning, before Sebastian would believe that the poison had run its course and she was her normal, graceful self again. Or so he said. Aeryn rather thought that the second set had just been for gratuitous viewing. 

Macie joined them for breakfast in the study, grumbling about the early hour. "Never had to get up like this working for Roget." She took her porridge willingly enough, though. She had taken to eating hers like Sebastian, plainly and shared an amused glance as Aeryn added another spoonful of dried berries to her bowl.

"I imagine you didn't." Sebastian was inclined to be conciliatory. "But you had best get used to it. We tend to be up early."

"And you'll have to be up with the chickens to take lessons, anyway," Aeryn added, somewhat offhand. Sebastian winced, not sure it was the best way to break the news to the girl.

Sharp black eyes fixed on Aeryn, who lifted a brow. "What lessons?"

"The king and queen provide tutors for the other children in the palace. They've been generous enough to allow you to join the others, starting next week."

"I don't want to..." If she’d been standing, Aeryn rather thought the girl might have stomped her foot.

"Not so much a matter of what you want, Macie. It's too good an opportunity to pass up."

Macie attempted to wheedle, looking pathetic. "But that's what _you_ do...you're supposed to be teaching me."

Sebastian broke in. "Macie, we'd planned to hire a tutor or send you to the Chantry school. This way you get the best of both, chums and an education. It's a good thing for you, _a nighean_."

"I don't want to!" She shouted. "I'm not one of these palace brats. I wanna do what you said you'd teach me..."

"Enough. I told you what I had to teach you would go farther than swiping and popping locks. Knowledge opens doors, pup. Usually doors with nicer things behind them. And occasionally dragons, but still..." Aeryn's attempt at humor fell flat and Macie stood up, scowling and shoved her bowl of half finished porridge away. 

"I'm done."

"And we haven't excused you," Sebastian said firmly. 

"I... _fine_. C’n I be excused?" Defiance in her body and resentment in her voice. But at least she asked.

"You may." 

As the girl stomped away, Aeryn called, "Be ready in a half mark, please. We're going to walk the square and see what we can turn up that looks interesting."

Sebastian looked at Aeryn, apprehensively as she eyed the door that Macie had just slammed. Aeryn spoke quietly. "If that had been me, I'd have had a set of stripes for it."   
He took a breath before he answered, "Aeryn, I dinna want to..." 

A pleading blue gaze met her and she touched his thigh, gently. "I know. Me, either. But we're going to have to figure out something, right? If we were in our own place, I'd set chores or...but this place is full of servants. I don't know..." 

"We'll set our minds to it. Maybe Varric has a creative idea or two."

"Alright." And hope that it worked. 

Young Harry's voice called from the landing door. "M'lady. King Alistair is requesting you and the Prince and your companions to join him in the throne room."

Aeryn let him in and asked, "Hoping, or..?" 

"By way of an order, m'lady, yes." He gave her a roguish grin and Aeryn chuckled. 

"On our way, then, pup."

"M'lady...I couldn't help but hear..."

"Our shouting match?" 

Harry nodded. "I could...we like Alcard and Josie, our tutors. They're good folk. Can I talk to Macie?" 

"Harry, lad. If you can talk her down, we'd be in your debt.,” Sebastian assured him. 

"Will do, then, Your Highness." The boy ambled off after their ward, scavenging an apple from the table, first.

>>>\----- >

 

Quite the scene met them a few minutes later when they gathered in the hall. The unlit room was shadowy and empty except for the seneschal, and an older man, just barely keeping himself from shaking apart, who was kneeling before Alistair. The king wore a discomfited expression and looked relieved to see them. "Lady Hawke." 

Formality, then. Aeryn curtsied and asked, "Your Majesty. We were requested?" 

"There seems to be a...complication...with the incident last night. This is the assassin's _father_ , Eirik." He paused, and indicated that the man should stand. "Ser, please repeat what you told me to the lady." 

The man turned to her, eyes red with lack of sleep and tears and face creased with grief. He had to swallow before he spoke. "My daughter, ser, Marla. She's a _good_ girl. She was so happy to join the royal staff. Couple o' days ago...she didn't come right home like usual. She was hours late, not like her at all and when she did come home...she was all quiet and rumpled. I thought maybe she had herself a boy..." Eirik rubbed his hands over his face and looked back up at her. "I didn't think...but she was so _quiet_ , not like herself. But she's not...her uncle died at Ostagar, m'lady. Her mam died here at Denerim when the 'spawn came. Marla never heard one good word about that traitor, Loghain, growing up. I can't believe she would..." he sobbed. 

Aeryn exchanged glances with Alistair. He was clearly inclined to think something was amiss, but he let Aeryn to continue her questioning. "Was she...Marla, I mean. Was she trained with a knife? Any sort of skillset in hand to hand?" 

Eirik cleared his throat. "Well...I...I got her a knife when she started going out to work. It's not always safe for a gal walking the streets late. I wanted her to have some chance. But, outside of pulling it fast and maybe being able to stick it in someone trying to get at her, no." 

"She was fast enough last nigh,." Fenris rumbled behind her. 

"Yeah. But she was also moving like someone who knew how to fight," Aeryn reminded him. 

"True." 

Sebastian asked, "Has the girl said anything in her own defense?" 

"I summoned the guard posted to Drakon's cellblock. She should be here soon." 

"Eirik, could she have been...persuaded? Anything you're up to that could be used against her?" The man didn't look like a back alley type, but appearances were deceiving, Aeryn knew. 

"I'm just a plain cobbler, m'lady. I don't get up to anything much. This is the first time I been out of my square since last month." She looked at his hands. They had the marks of his work, cuts and scars from his leather work, stains around his fingernails from tanning dyes. The tip of one finger was heavily callused, from where the awl hit when he pierced leather to lace and sew. Calluses. She glanced at her own hands. Nicely shaped enough, and hey, her nails were clean for a change, but...they bore the marks of her work too. And the girl's? Marla's? 

Aeryn couldn't remember. She'd been foggy enough from the poison that if she'd noticed, it hadn't stuck. But the way Marla had fought back? The accuracy of that thrown knife had indicated someone familiar with knifework. And nice serving girls with cobbler fathers didn't just stumble on spider venom blends. 

The doors to the throne room opened again, to admit the guard. She was allowed to carry her short sword and shield in the presence of the king, and both showed signs of past use. Her bronzed armor gleamed with care and when she removed her helmet and saluted, she was about Aeryn's age, tall and square-shouldered, dark hair pulled back neat and tight from her forehead. "Lieutenant Nerys reporting, Your Majesty." 

"Lieutenant, did you bring along the prisoner?" 

"Yes, sire. She's being held in the antechamber. I was wondering you might want to see her, considering..." Suddenly uncomfortable, as if she was startled by her own forthcoming, the guard grimaced and straightened her shoulders even more. 

"Considering what?" 

"She was stone quiet when she was brought in. Just sat staring at the wall. And then long about two bells...she got real agitated. Started just…wailing. Said she hadn't done anything. Wanted to see her father. Didn't seem to remember anything. The other one told her to shut up, but she didn't, just kept insisting she'd never do anything to hurt the queen." 

Alistair considered the guard for a minute. "You've been at Drakon for a few years, Guardsman?" 

"Yes, Your Majesty. I took a spear to the thigh back in '34. I can't march any more, but it doesn't keep me from my duty." 

"What's your opinion of the prisoner?" 

Nerys considered a moment. "I...well, assassins are tricky folk, sire. Most of them are good at pretending to be what they aren't. I wouldn't want to judge on one night." 

Well, thought Aeryn. She was smart enough to know something about assassins. "Give it a try, though?" 

The guard eyed Aeryn in her leathers and the empty scabbards at her back and gave a knowing nod. "M'lady. I'd say that one hadn't ever killed so much as a chicken. She's not...she doesn't have the eye for it, if you know what I mean? Nothing...calculating about her." 

"Last night, she was definitely stalking. She was _hiding_ in plain sight. Very like an assassin." 

"Then...she's either _really_ good. Or she's not...what she seemed to be." 

Aeryn could feel the curiosity of her companions buzzing around her. They'd been too long without something interesting to occupy them. 

Alistair nodded. "Bring her in. Let's talk to her." 

They were silent, waiting for Nerys to escort Marla into the throne room. Eirik gasped when he saw his daughter. She did look the worse for wear, Aeryn thought. The girl had washed, but her nose was crooked and swollen and her eyes were blacked. Strawberry blonde hair, like her father’s, hung limply around a round face. Her whole slim body trembled and she didn't have an ounce of the bravado that had allowed her to shout at a king in the midst of his court the night before. 

"Marla, girl!" 

Marla whimpered, "Da! Da, I didn't. I didn't, I swear, by the Beloved. I could never..." 

"Be silent, girl." Nerys pushed her to her knees before the king. Marla looked up at Alistair on the throne and prostrated herself on the blue carpet at his feet. 

"Please, please. Your Majesty. I wouldn't! By the Maker, by his holy Andraste, I would never hurt Queen Dierdre. I..." 

"Enough." Alistair was cool and blunt. "Hawke? What do you think?" 

Aeryn crouched down, fluidly, poised on the balls of her feet and ready to flip away if needed. "Do you remember me?" 

"Nnno. No, m'lady." 

"I'm the one who broke your wrist and your nose. You caught me with a knife, with poison. Do you recall that?" 

"Poison?" Marla sounded lost. "I...never...No, m'lady. I'm s...sorry." 

She _sounded_ terrified, the dark pupils of her eyes were huge with fright, the pulse in her throat fluttered. She smelled of it. But there was a noose waiting. She'd have seen it when they brought her to the palace. Aeryn would have been hard pressed not to be just as scared, in this girl's shoes. One thing to die in the heat of battle, another thing entirely to have to _wait_ for death. To see it coming. 

"Sit up." Aeryn waited while the girl struggled to comply. "Let me see your hands." Wide eyed, Marla held her hands out like a child for inspection. Reddened knuckles. Chipped nails. Torn cuticles. Calluses, yes. But these were the hands of a woman who spent her time scrubbing and chopping carrots and digging in a garden. There were no signs of the hard earned calluses that knifework earned you. The marks of constant, repetitive practice. Nor of the scars that close combat always garnered. Swiftly, Aeryn flipped Marla a coin. "Catch!" Tricks to judge reflexes, as she'd been teaching Macie. 

"Wha..." The coin clattered to the ground, after hitting her in her the chest. Marla hadn't moved fast enough to even deflect it. There was just no way. But how, then, had she acted as she had last night? 

Sebastian had a curious look on his face and Aeryn raised her eyebrow at him, wondering. Clearing his throat, he came around and knelt before Marla. 

"What happened the night you were late coming home, lass?" 

Marla looked up at the warm tones of Sebastian's voice and his gentle approach. Aeryn smiled inwardly. That was a nice tactic, considering how abrupt Aeryn's own questioning had been. 

"I...I don't...don't know. I was...it was dark. I had stayed late to help Cook with the decoration of some tarts. I'm good at that. And...and I walked down the old Saint's Way stairwell, it's a short cut." She closed her eyes for a minute, rubbing her wrapped wrist and going even paler. No one had bothered to heal a prisoner set to hang, Sebastian noted and glanced at Aeryn and then Bethany. Hesitating, Aeryn turned to whisper to Alistair. 

"Go ahead," the king said after considering a moment. 

"Lady Bethany," Sebastian asked, "could you aid us?" 

Bethany stepped up and set her hands on Marla's arm and brushed her cheek. Pulses of warm magic thrummed and Marla visibly relaxed, her bruises fading. "Oh. Oh, thank you!" Her eyes were wide and Bethany simply smiled, patted the healed arm, and slipped back behind Fenris. 

Marla continued, rubbing her arm with a look of astonishment. She'd likely never been healed by magic. "I don't remember, just coming home and feeling very...odd. I had such strange dreams that night. And like...like someone was in my head...talking. Whispering." 

Sebastian startled and Aeryn's eyes focused on him. "Whispering what, Marla?" 

She was pale, again. "Awful... _awful_ things. Like claws." A shudder ran through her. "I can't...I've never had such wicked things in my head, ser. And...and like it was trying to teach me. I'd wake up sore, like I'd been hauling hides all day." 

That, Sebastian thought, sounded terribly familiar. But Anders wasn't here to do...whatever it was the mage had done to Sebastian when he'd been subject to blood magic's cruelty. Only Merrill and Bethany. 

"Oh! And...I had a token. I had to keep it with me. I'd touch it, all the time. I carried it in my pocket." 

Oh, really? "Aeryn..." But she'd already pulled it out. 

"Is this it?" Aeryn held out the black runestone to the girl and Marla recoiled as if she'd been pushed. 

Fenris snapped, "Where did you get that?!" 

Aeryn looked at her partner, startled. "From her, apparently. What is it?" 

"A Tevinter magister's family mark. A stone used to mark those who... _belong_... to certain magisters. Those who have the right to do their work." 

Aeryn felt her skin crawl and had to shove back the urge to drop it and have Bethany crush it to dust with one of her force spells. "Merrill..." 

The elf trotted up to Aeryn's side and reached out a hand to let her cool, green magic curl over the stone. "Ooh. Not nice at all, Hawke. This is...demons have touched this." Aeryn _did_ drop the forsaken thing at that and it gave a high pinging sound when it hit the floor and didn't bounce. She wiped her hand on her jerkin, as if the stone had left a greasy film on her gloved hand. "What about Marla, Merrill? Can you...?" 

Merrill tipped her head. "Yes. But..." Wide hazel eyes got even bigger and Aeryn sucked air through her teeth. 

_Well, Void. No. Let's avoid open blood magic in the throne room_. She gave Merrill a high sign, to wait just a minute. "Er. Bethany? How about you?" 

"I can try." She'd been with Aeryn and Anders the time they'd rescued Keran from the blood mages below Kirkwall. Anders had shown her the trick of jolting a demon out of hiding. And since it also had the benefit of breaking a blood mage's hold, it might work here. Bethany concentrated a moment, pulling the old spirit spell out of her memory. Then a bolt of blueish light lanced between her and Marla. 

Eirik cried out as Marla collapsed against the flagged floor. "Marla!" 

Aeryn glanced at Merrill, who shrugged. She couldn’t tell without the proper spell and the proper spell required… _Sod_. There was no way the Templar trained king wouldn’t notice. 

“Your Majesty, I…need permission to do something…unorthodox.” Sebastian heard the hesitance in Aeryn’s voice and stood.

Alistair regarded her warily. “Alright, Hawke,” he said, finally. 

Merrill reached out with her own magic, so quick with her wicked little pearl handled dagger that her audience never saw it. Still, Aeryn saw Alistair's head jerk around and his eyes narrow in Merrill’s direction as Marla picked herself up. 

"I'm all right, da. Better...I think." 

"Definitely blood controlled. I'm not sure how," Merrill whispered apologetically. "Something deep and subtle...but not actively possessed." Louder, she added, "Bethany's spell broke the compulsion, though. I _can_ tell that. Marla’s free, now." 

"What about the man who was with this girl?" Fenris asked. "He was armed, but he did not act." 

Marla shook her head. "I don't know who...I've never met him." 

Lieutenant Nerys spoke up. "He's called Maren Gaven. The Guard's had an eye on him as part of a group of sedition spreaders. We've been trying to get a hold on him. He's definitely guilty. Of something." The last was said with a dark humor. 

Aeryn considered a moment. "It seems rather a coincidence that they were both on hand at the same time. I'd say they must have come in together. Would seditionists use blood magic, though?" She asked, skeptically. 

"We have seen blood mages use sedition groups to spread influence before, though." Sebastian reminded Aeryn, quietly. 

She nodded. "There is that." At Alistair's curious look, she explained. "In Kirkwall, blood mages used a mutiny among Templars to expand their chaos. It helped make Meredith even more paranoid. Your Majesty, I would say that Marla isn't an assassin. Just someone who was used badly because of their position in your household." 

"If they can turn serving maids into killers, we have a grave problem." Alistair frowned, thinking over his options. "Brendan, I need three messengers. One set to go overseas, immediately. I can get a note to Zevran. He's got better ties, he might know if there was anything to know about blood mages training assassins. And then we need to have the staff gone over with a fine tooth comb, see if anyone else has been...tampered with." The seneschal bowed and left the room to set the king’s orders into motion.

"I'll have Varric get into it with the Guild and the Carta, too. And Isabela usually knows a few rocks to turn over and see what crawls out. The rest of us can check out that stairwell that Marla used as a short cut, see if we can turn up anything in the neighborhood," Aeryn offered to Alistair's agreement. 

"Your Majesty..." Lieutenant Nerys spoke, with some hesitation, considering her company. "Do I understand you mean to allow this woman to go free? She _did_ assault the queen. And if she has been tainted by blood magic..." 

With an audible sigh, the king shook his head. "I can't hang a woman for being violated, Lieutenant. Any suggestions, Hawke? Since it seems you've had some...dealings with such things?" Aeryn winced inwardly at the undercurrent in his voice. 

Sebastian squeezed her arm and Aeryn let him speak, instead. "I was so influenced, once, Alistair. There will be lingering nightmares, but if Bethany has truly broken the influence then Marla is no longer a threat." 

Alistair nodded, but he had an intrigued look, as if he wanted to question Sebastian more closely. "Take her home, Eirik. We'll discuss her work, but I may have to send you elsewhere. I do not want the queen further distressed and she is...unused to such events." Weighing his options, he added, "There may be positions for both of you at Redcliffe or Rainesfere. Let me make some inquiries. Stay close to home, for now. We may need to speak with Marla again." 

Eirik stood and gathered his daughter to him. "Thank you, Your Majesty. Truly, the Maker has blessed Ferelden with your rule." He bowed as low as a man of his age could manage and helped a shaking, thankfully stammering Marla drop a shallow curtsy and then guided her to the door under Nerys' disapproving gaze. Sebastian made a note to mention to someone at the Chantry to look in on them. They'd seemed to be religious and might take comfort in a home visitation, if a sympathetic mother was available. 

"You're dismissed, Lieutenant. Thank you for your help. And your concern is noted, believe me. Gaven's execution will have to wait, as well, now, until we've spoken with him further." 

Nerys bowed and withdrew, her armor clanking lightly. Aeryn noticed a slight limp, remnants of the spear that had turned the woman's career. 

There was just Alistair and the companions, now. Alistair stared gravely at Aeryn and Sebastian could feel her tension, just a moment before Aeryn stuck her chin up with a certain air of defiance. 

"So. Merrill. You're a blood mage." The king spoke conversationally, but the underlying flatness brooked no avoidance. 

"Yes. I am. Your Majesty." Merrill added the title, as a clear afterthought. She was still Dalish, the last of the People. And he was a _human_ king, no matter that he'd given the elvhen a piece of land and walked as a second to and as the beloved of Lyna Mahariel. Her hazel eyes were level and she did not quail. 

Aeryn was just a little proud of her, despite everything. And Alistair looked a bit...amused...underneath the concern. 

"Was it really necessary to perform that piece of magic in my home?" 

"If you wanted to know the truth about the girl, yes." Merrill indicated Bethany. "Neither of us are spirit healers, to be in tune with the Beyond...um, the Fade, so intimately. I used my...connection...to be sure. I did _not_ summon anything here. I would not do that. Unless it _was_ really necessary." She amended. 

"Hawke?" 

"Merrill's chosen to follow that path. I...have done my best to make sure of her safety to others...but in all fairness, her pursuit of forbidden magic has never made her a danger to us. Yet." Aeryn felt it necessary to qualify her statement and she could see the shadows growing in Merrill's eyes. 

Merrill knew Aeryn's opinion of blood magic. And, too, she knew that Aeryn had kept her close because Aeryn wanted to be on hand if anything went wrong, especially after she'd given Merrill the Arulin'Holm. They had been friends, though, and Aeryn would not see her hurt for something Aeryn had made use of. _Just as you occasionally used Justice for your own benefit_ , her conscience whispered, _and see where that led_. 

Fenris made a sneering grunt behind her and Aeryn shook her head, warning. Marethari brought her own end on herself. And the other elves had made their choice. Merrill had not forced them to fight. 

As if reading her thoughts, the king grimaced and sat down heavily on his throne, slouching a little. "So, you brought an abomination _and_ a blood mage to Ferelden. Couldn't have just dropped them off somewhere else along the way?" His tone was light, though. 

"This was their home, too. Once upon a time." Aeryn shrugged. "And, Alistair, I have mentioned that I myself am a dangerous and controversial house guest. The Free Marches and Orlais might well consider you to be harboring a criminal, but it would be me they meant." Sebastian watched her; the stillness and the lazy posture were covers for her tension. She'd need a bit of comfort, later. 

Alistair gave a rueful smile. "Well, I've already pardoned you for that. I would request, though, that no blood magic be used here. I don't want any chance of the walls between here and the Fade growing thin on palace grounds. We've enough trouble with that in Ferelden." 

"I don't have to, to use magic. I'll be careful," Merrill promised quietly. 

"Thank you. You know, a few years ago I'd have gone with you to check this all out. But I have meetings I can't put off and this should be done quickly. My trip to the Marches set a few things back. We’ll have to cover some ground and investigate a few of the noble families, as well." Grimly, he explained, "I had hoped that bringing a few noble children into fosterage in hopes of finding a suitable designated heir would make things better for Ferelden. An easier transition, later. But between seditionists and the outraged parents now that Dierdre's...well. It's not like I'm turning the fosterlings out. There's no guarantee that..." Alistair bit off the ill thought. 

"Is that what our page, Harry, is? A fosterling?" Aeryn had wondered, but the boy had been closed mouthed about it. 

"Oh, no. No. Harry's my nephew. I had a half-sister that died during the siege of Denerim. She...well...I made it a point to get her surviving children well settled. Harry wants to train as a knight, in a year or two when he's up to size. The others are all apprenticed out, except for the baby. She's being raised by the Chantry until she's ten and then we'll see her settled, too. Can't lift them up to the nobility, but...they won't be taking in washing for scraps of coin, either." 

"It's kind of you, Alistair." 

"Not at all. Just the least I could do. Well...let me know what you turn up. Brendan's got orders to give you full access. Sebastian..." 

"Yes?" 

"Teagan's gone back to Redcliffe to deal with a few things. He's been my main advisor since...well, my uncle Eamon and I had a difference of opinion a couple of years ago. I could use a...second set of eyes, especially in my dealings with the Marcher Lords and their people. Any chance you'd mind shadowing me about? Not today....give the court a little time to adjust to you lot being around, let the gossip settle. But, in a few days I've got the ambassador from Cumberland coming. I could use the help." 

Sebastian glanced at Aeryn who gave him an encouraging smile. "I'd be honored." It was subtly done of Alistair. Better than, 'you've got a lot to learn. Better start catching up.' which had been how he'd been dropped into the services of the Chantry, when he'd joined. 

"That's great. Thanks." Alistair wearily levered himself up. "I'll let Dierdre know what happened this morning. Blood controlled assassins. There's a thing for you..." He shook his head and headed for the withdrawing room as the companions walked to the doors. 

 

Aeryn sent a message to Macie through Harry, telling the girl to find six good hiding spots along the palace boundaries. It wasn't as good a lesson as having Aeryn along, but it would be a start. Two other messengers took notes to Varric and Isabela and Aeryn, Sebastian, Bethany, and Merrill picked up their gear before making their way to Fort Drakon to speak with Maren Gaven. 

>>>\----- >

They were just about to the open courtyard before the menacing Fort, when Sebastian voiced what he'd been pushing around in his thoughts. "So, had Alistair acted last night, he'd have been killing an innocent woman." It was another thing to weigh, Sebastian reasoned. Grounds to not make decisions in the heat of the moment. 

"Or I would have." Aeryn caught Sebastian's surprised expression out of the corner of her eye. "It was a close thing, for a second, my love. I wasn't...had we not been in the midst of a party, I'd have done it without a thought." 

Fenris was listening and interjected. "And you would have been justified. If one has an assassin in hand, it is the most reasonable thing to think she is there of her own free will." 

Sebastian replied, "Even assassins deserve a chance to defend themselves. And to make their case before man and their Maker." Aeryn smiled a little cynically, exchanging a glance with Fenris. Sebastian resisted the impulse to grumble. "What, then, am I missing?" 

"Well, I never really expected any chance at defending myself _verbally_ when I went in for a job, Sebastian. I expected to kill or be killed in the moment. I rather think it's the usual way of things, among those of us who kill for coin." Behind them, Bethany made a soft, sad little noise, being reminded of Aeryn's former employment. 

Sebastian tsked. "Well, then, that's a usual thing that should be changed. At the very least, an assassin can accuse the person who hired them. And there are often mitigating circumstances. In the eyes of the Maker, the employer is just as guilty, if not more so." 

Aeryn looked at him, puzzled. "Do you truly think, despite the fact that Meeran usually just sat about on his arse, that he was more guilty of murder than I?" 

"Or that Danarius bears all the responsibility for the deaths that I caused on his orders?" 

Aeryn and Fenris were staring at him, openly skeptical now. "Well, there's a matter of free will. Neither of you were mentally controlled, outside of...certain things. So, no, not all of the responsibility. But yes, I think you...neither of you...are burdened of all the guilt, nor even most." It was part of how he prayed for them, that they might be forgiven on the basis that they were, Aeryn and Fenris both, products of other people's manipulation. 

There was another exchange of glances between the two. "I do not know that I accept that, Sebastian," Fenris finally managed. 

Aeryn was quiet and her eyes were shadowed as she scanned the approach to the fort. This was one of the hardest things for Sebastian to understand, why they were so...reluctant...to accept that they were not wholly responsible for their past sins. Not innocent, no. And more power to them for never justifying their pasts, but, it created such a difficult wall to overcome. He could but keep trying, knowing he was the closest either of them would get to a counseling priest. 

Sebastian caught Aeryn's hand and tucked it securely in the crook of his arm and covered her cool fingers with his own warmer ones. "I do, though. And am I not to be your prince?" He gave a self-deprecating grin, tugging a slight smile from Aeryn and a shake of the head from Fenris. 

>>>\----- > \---000--- 

Fort Drakon was now famous as the site of the final battle with the Archdemon, but it still functioned as the state prison of Ferelden. While the public rooms the companions were first shown into were neatly appointed, the Tevinter structure still bore marks of that final struggle. Scorch marks on the stone, divots and gouges showing the path that the Hero had taken to climb the tower. 

As they went deeper into the fortress, following a guard who had been waiting for them, they grew silent. The atmosphere was oppressive, inimical to chatter. As they walked through the ballista storage, the guard's steps rang hollowly on the stone. He turned and looked at them oddly once and Sebastian had to smile, when he realized why. He and Aeryn were lightfooted enough to barely make a sound, despite their boots. Merrill and Fenris were yet barefoot, padding silently, and Bethany was wearing softly soled shoes, meant for the halls of the Gallows. It was a silent crew Aeryn had built around her. 

The companions were met at the heavy, barred door between the guard quarters and the prison by Lieutenant Nerys. "Maren's been kicking up a fuss. Wants to know why he's being delayed in his glorious death. Thinks he's a martyr."

Aeryn smirked. "Well, that won't do." 

He was a man of average height and reasonably attractive appearance, but he had a gleam in his light blue eyes that spoke of obsession. "Finally, my accusers come to confront me! But I have no qualm in dying for a righteous cause!" 

"Ooh. Pompous. That's fun." Aeryn sauntered up and leaned against his cell. "So, tell me something, Gaven. Where did you find your accomplice?"

"Why was she allowed to die first?"

"Well, ladies before gents and all." Aeryn saw no need to disabuse him of his mistake. 

Gaven scoffed, "That one's no lady. She had hands like a washerwoman. Before..." But he swallowed what he was saying and a brief look of fear crossed his face. 

Arching an eyebrow, Aeryn rotated her hand in a drawing out motion, "Oh, you're doing so well. Before....?"

"I'm not telling you anything. I want my death so that the cause can..."

"Yes, yes. No worry, Gaven. I have no doubt the king will accommodate you. But not until you start talking, so let's hear it. Was Marla always part of the group?" He actually made a motion like he was buttoning his lips, and turned to stare away from them.

Sighing, Aeryn glanced back at her partner. "Fenris? Care to lend a hand loosening his tongue?"

"Of course, Hawke." Sebastian started as Fenris engaged his lyrium. Surely Aeryn didn't mean to have Fenris rip the man's heart out?

Nerys swore in surprise, "Maker's Balls!" 

And Gaven's eyes were wide on the elf. "What in the vast Void is that?!" He shrieked, the pompous voice now squeaky.

"What?" Aeryn's lip was curved wickedly and her voice was sickly and sweet. "Oh...you mean Fenris' party trick. He's got a talent for touching the hearts of hard men. Care to have him demonstrate?" She was spinning a small blade in her hand, threateningly.

Gaven plastered himself against the far wall of the cell. "No! No..." He looked wildly at the guard and begged, "You can't...you can't let them torture me!"

"Mate, I'm not sure what they're doing. But you kind of lost your bargaining chips by threatening our queen. From what I saw this morning, the king lets 'em do whatever." Nerys shook her head. "Still not sure I believe what happened to that girl." Sebastian had to hide a smile. Nerys was a cunning negotiator, herself, to pull off that half-truth.  
Fenris glowed a little more intensely and Aeryn put the key to the cell in the lock. "Hey!" Nerys checked her belt, "Where in bloody Flames did you..."

Bethany laid a hand on the guards shoulder and shushed her. Gaven was babbling.

"Never saw her before yesterday, I swear! She...we hired a group of...we thought they were assassins, but they said they had a way of getting people inside. And then that girl showed up yesterday morning, said she could get me in to the party and...I didn't know _she_ was their assassin. _I_ won the coin toss, it was _my_ right to put the whore down..."

"Enough of that. Where did this group come from? Were they Crows?" 

"No...I don't know. They...we got the information from our...sponsors. Just some contact details and then they showed up and named their price. Took damn near a month to scrape up that kind of coin, but then they coughed up that girl and said she'd get me in."

"Well, she did that. You didn't know she was the designated killer?"

"No. No, Void it all, it was supposed to be _me_." 

"Did you know the group had a Tevinter blood mage working for them?"

Gaven's mouth gaped. So, that's a no, then, Aeryn thought. "What? No. _No_! Maker's sake, what do you take me for? We want that bastard and his whore off the throne so that the Chantry can reclaim..." His mouth snapped shut again. 

Aeryn's smile went cold and Sebastian's heart thudded, painfully. Not the Chantry, please Maker. Not again, please. Don't let it be true.

"You're working for the Chantry?" Aeryn's head tipped to the side, her tone conversational. And her knife was tapping against the iron bar of the cell door.

"We're _faithful_. We're doing the Maker's work. There wasn't a blood mage, you're _lying_. Kill me. Torture me. I don't care, you bitch." 

"There _was_ a blood mage. Stuck his fingers in Marla's brain and twisted. Made her do things she'd never do without it. And you _are_ going to tell me where you met your group of assassins and where they came from." Aeryn's smile had teeth, now and Sebastian had to physically restrain himself from pulling her back, to let her continue her intimidation. That was all it was, he hoped. 

Fenris growled, "Allow me."

Gaven was collapsing down the wall as Fenris stepped into the cell. "Orlais. We...got the information from a patron in Orlais. Not the Divine. They were staying in a house off of Saint's Way. I met them there once, to drop off a payment. I can show you on a city map. Please..." He gasped the last as Fenris brushed his flaring fingers along the man's chest and the elf paused to glance back at his partner.

"Good enough, Hawke?" 

"Yeah, cut it off, Fenris." The lyrium subsided and Fenris stepped out of the cell. 

" _Demons, magic_..." Maren Gaven was superior no longer, just a quivering pile of flesh on the dirty floor. Aeryn handed Nerys her keys with a crooked grin as they left her to deal and take the information.

\---000---

Sebastian was quiet as they traced their steps back to town, aiming for the site Gaven had pointed out. Saint's Way was a small cut between the Palace and the Market district. Quiet, and not an area that was frequented by casual visitors to Denerim, according to Nerys. 

Aeryn eyed him thoughtfully and then nudged his shoulder. "I don't think the Chantry's involved, Sebastian. Not really."

There was something hopeful in his eyes when he looked up at her from where he'd been watching his feet. "Do you not?"

"Maybe...it's possible that one or more connections are there, but I think Gaven just thinks they're doing what the Maker would want them to do. It's far more likely this is some thread that the Orlesians are trying to tug, to see if Alistair is weak on his throne and if not, to make him so. They may even claim to have support from the Chantry...but I really don't think so. Even I don't think the Divine would ally herself with bloodmages doing this kind of thing." 

Relief rippled through him. She couldn't know, it was true. But that she just didn't assume made him relax. "Thank you, _mo chridhe_." 

"I may need you to...ask around, though. When you go to Chant. See if anything turns up that shouldn't." She slipped her hand into his. "Just in case."

"If they are...like Petrice, doing something outside the bounds of propriety...it should be routed out,” Sebastian agreed. "I'll see what I can do."

Oh, good man. "I know." He squeezed her fingers. 

"Hawke..." 

"Yeah, Merrill?" 

"Do Fereldans often leave their doors open to the air?" She was pointing to the neatly built yellow brick house that Gaven had spoken of. The day had turned damp and cloudy while they were in Drakon. If anyone had aired their house out, they wouldn't still be doing it, taking the chance of turning their upholstery musty. 

"No...I think our prey scarpered in a hurry."

Or it could be scavengers, looting an abandoned home. Which is what it was. 

Sebastian found himself praying over the corpses of the three men, who had fought back with knives and firebombs.

But there was no trace of the bloodmage until Merrill followed an itch in her shoulders down to the cellar. A sanguinary table and a small set of flechettes, left in the bottom of a trunk, left little doubt that the group had been here. 

They went over the house with all their skill, but all they turned up was some rotting food in the kitchen and a few lost socks. Finally, Aeryn sighed. "C'mon. Let's go tell Alistair what we _did_ find."

 

>>>\----- > \---000---

Sebastian stumbled on the archery range by accident, on his way to lunch with Alistair. Aeryn had taken Macie with her, Bethany, and Isabela to shop and prowl the square, looking for marks. "Just looking. Not actually stealing. I want to know how she picks a target," Aeryn promised, innocence playing across her face when she kissed him goodbye. 

He'd been meaning to ask. Outside of the small skirmish in the alley, it had been a few days since he'd practiced and it was one of the things he meant to ask Alistair. And then walking down one of the stone corridors, he'd heard it. The unmistakable thrum of an arrow in the air, the sing of a bowstring. He followed his ears, and was surprised to find Queen Dierdre unstringing a bow in a small area, just off the main courtyard. He was stopped by one of several guards who noted his appearance and he heard the unmistakable sound of a crossbow ratcheting as it was cocked. There were no chances being taken, now. 

But Dierdre waved him in. "Prince Vael. I hope you all are settling well." 

"Quite well, thank you, Your Highness. Forgive me, I did not mean to intrude." 

"Not at all." She indicated the small butts littered about and poorly placed, shallowly shot arrows sticking out. "As you can see, I'm not up to much these days. I'm....being too careful and it plays havoc with my aim. You need a practice range, I imagine?" 

"I had wondered..." 

"Please feel free to use this one. We don't have a flete of archers at the palace, just a few scouts who use it occasionally. Tell the arms master and he'll have the apprentices set up your targets." Her lady-in-waiting was nervously tapping her foot at the queen’s side and Dierdre made her excuses, politely. "Alright, Mathilde. I'm sorry, Prince Vael. I have an appointment. I just wanted a bit of exercise." 

He bowed and she withdrew, the other woman plainly trying not to appear to herd the queen, but failing. The guardsman who had stopped him offered, "If you like, m'lord, a couple of us are off duty. I'll have 'em tell Gerry to get his lads clearing the range." 

Sebastian had to stop himself from denying the honorific. He needed to make himself more used to it, now. "Thank you, I would appreciate it." 

"My pleasure, m'lord." The man snapped off a traditional Fereldan bow, arms across his chest, and strode off, briskly. 

It was an enjoyable lunch. Alistair gave him the run down on the various Marchers in Ferelden as they...well, Alistair...downed an astonishing amount of cold beef and ham, a loaf or two and platter of various pickled vegetables and radishes. Sebastian recalled many of the various lords, stories of his youth and the more intimate knowledge that came from long familiarity with family lines. Alistair had his scribe taking notes about the deeper ties he hadn't known of. "That Robard seems to be a fellow to know, then. I'm glad he accepted the invitation to Satinalia." 

"Oh?" 

"Dierdre wanted to have a big to-do this year, since it'll be the last time she gets to be fancy-free during a party. So we sent invites all over Thedas. Raven's Reach sent theirs back...when, Micah?" He asked the unobtrusive scribe. 

Shuffling through some notes, the young man answered, "Last week, Your Majesty." 

Laird Robard was one of the connections Sebastian cultivated from Kirkwall. It would be good to have the man face to face, finally. "He's a fine ally. They're intermarried through-out Northern Thedas. Even have one or two connections in the Empire." 

Continuing their discussion, Alistair began rattling off an explanation of why the ambassador from Cumberland had to be entertained separately from the one from Tantervale. Some sort of an incident at a tourney. "Apparently, someone's cousin made some comment about the color of his stockings and..." 

Sebastian _was_ listening, he was. But he could do that and consider whether he should consider breaking in a new bow. His grandfather's was his favored weapon, but there were occasions when it would be handy to have a shorter range or a lighter draw. Aeryn had a beautiful elvhen short bow, ironwood, that had been gifted to her by a grateful client and it had the loveliest, smoothest action as well as an ice rune that he thought would complement the runes Aeryn was so fond of. Sebastian was positive he'd seen it when she was going through the trunk looking for a smaller dagger set for Macie...and, wait, what? 

Alistair was chuckling. Sebastian was mortified. How long had he been ignoring the man? A flush of shame ran up his neck. Maker, had he no better self-control now than he’d had as a lad at his lessons? 

"Alistair...I apologize. I..." 

The king waved his hand. "Nah. Never mind. I know the look of someone who'd prefer to be on the field. There's only so much of this stuff a man can take before he's got to hit something. Trust me, I _know_. Anyway, I promised to attend some presentation with Dierdre or I'd join you." 

Sebastian took his leave and managed not to _run_ back to his room for his bow. And, this was familiar, too. Released from drudgery and eager to pursue his preferred way of passing time. 

Still, with his weapon in hand and standing before the targets, anchored, centered, _grounded_ instead of bobbing on the sea, Sebastian could not help but be happy. The targets were a wee bit poorly spaced and he’d have to see about getting the far ones moved back. But by the Maker, it was freeing to lose himself in the focus, again. He set to draw, firing in the rhythm of the Chant of Trials to warm up. 

When Aeryn's low, musical voice behind him brought Sebastian back to the outer world, the shadows were starting to stretch around the courtyard. "No, this is...about average, I'd say. If you think this is a display, you should see him on moving targets." 

"Average? He split that arrow as it struck the bullseye!" 

"Hmm. Yes, well, you're right. It _is_ impressive; it's easy to forget when he makes it look so effortless." She chuckled, warm and sweet, and he had to take a second breath before the next release. "I remember the first time...well, the second, I realized how talented he was. Shade had me by the hair, had my arm twisted up. Sebastian had about a two inch space between my arm and my head and that arrow struck the forsaken thing right in the eye. Most beautiful shot..." And when had that happened, he wondered. Had her by the hair? But he'd only fought with them once before Aeryn cut it short again, after the fight at the Harriman Estate. Sebastian didn't recall taking that shot...but he wouldn't. He had been so distracted by his sense of betrayal and the desire demon, he didn't remember many of the details of that fight. 

Sebastian turned, then, and caught Aeryn’s eye, earning her acknowledging smile. Macie was sitting tailor-fashion next to Aeryn, the girl's black eyes wide on his work. He had some plans to try Macie on the bow, soon. She’d not shown much affinity with knife work, but she had a stillness to her that Sebastian thought might transfer well to archery. 

Aeryn was talking to a lightly armored woman, with a well made short bow slung across her shoulder, likely one of the scouts the queen mentioned. There were others gathered, to watch him, he realized, and Sebastian flushed at the rush of pride. 

Aeryn nodded as the scout raved about Sebastian's skill, but her attention was all on him. He had that loose, confident walk and the lingering burn in his eyes that he always got after he'd been practicing, as if there was some unfinished deed. Like a blade that only found its scabbard once blood was drawn. She wanted her brilliant archer to herself for a bit. 

"Macie?" 

"Yea...yes, ser?" 

"Collect Sebastian's arrows for him, please." 

"Why?" 

"Because I asked, because he's got other plans, pup. Then, you've got some free time. Stay out of trouble, hmm?" 

Macie glanced up at her and smiled just a little cynically. "Oh. Fine." The girl huffed as she stood and went to the range to pull Sebastian's crimson fletched arrows. 

Sebastian joined them, "Macie doesn't have to..." 

"Yes, she does. She made a couple of mistakes in the square this morning. Picking those up will sharpen her eye." Aeryn introduced him to the scout, Leary, and then excused them both. 

"Are we in a hurry, then?" He asked, amused, when they were out of earshot. 

Aeryn threw him a wicked, alluring smile. "Well, I could trip you here and have my way, but you might blush a bit." 

"Is that so?" He turned her into a recess between two tapestries, just a narrow cut, and pressed her against the stone. "Do your worst, _mo chridhe_." 

Aeryn twined her arms around his neck and, pulling him down, nudged his lips open to slide her tongue alongside. Hot and sweet, she stroked into his mouth, curling his toes in his boots with the suggestive touch. Slim fingers snagged into the sweat dampened hair at his nape. He groaned against Aeryn’s soft lips, and running his hands down her sides and under that lush backside, pulled her up and closer. Her leg hitched around his hip, to hold him and she set her clever fingers to the latch of his gorget. 

"Eep! Merciful Maker!" Sebastian glanced back over his shoulder. A Mother and her young assistant Sister were behind them, the older woman glaring at the younger, who was flushed and trying to stifle a giggle. 

" _Excuse_ us, please." The woman dragged the sister off, with a withering, disapproving shake of her head. And, yes, Sebastian felt the heat rise, pinked to his ears. 

Aeryn chuckled again, looking up at him with sly eyes. "Told you." She'd seen the Chantry ladies turn in behind them. 

"You knew!" 

"Yes, I did! 'Do your worst' you dare me, like I haven't been sparring with Varric and Isabela for years. You're lucky I didn't have my hands down your..." Sebastian muffled her mouth with his hand as a trio of servants turned the corner and eyed her heatedly when her tongue touched his fingers. When they passed, she tugged at his hand. "Now, can we go back to our room?" 

He barely had the door closed when she was flicking catches on his armor, the buckles falling easily open. "Aeryn...leannan, slow down. Let me clean up a bit." He'd sweated down in the sunny range. 

"Hmm, no, I don't think I will." Aeryn followed the traces of salt down his tanned throat with open mouth kisses. 

Her mouth was hot against his throat, the flick of her tongue sending shivers of sensation down the length of his spine. "Ah, really?" 

"Oh, _really_. Maker, Sebastian...you smell so good." She buried her nose in the hollow of his throat and breathed in. "And you taste...mmm...even better." Salt and clean, healthy sweat and the traces of soap and sun and a trace of incense from his early morning visit to the palace chapel. She wanted to drown in it. 

And who was he to argue, then? Sebastian had her leathers open and she shucked them off swiftly but he slid his hands under her tunic to skim it off, her own haste sparking his. He stopped though, as his fingers found lace and silk as opposed to the boned linen that she normally wore. "What's all this?" 

Hands busy at his laces, Aeryn mumbled, "Shopping." She'd forgotten all about the nonsense she'd let Isabela talk her into while they were out. 

Intrigued, Sebastian pulled her tunic up over her head, ignoring her impatient whine as he set her back. He wanted to see..."Holy Sweet Andraste..." Black silk cupping her breasts, turning her skin to alabaster, the feathery edge of lace. "This is..." He let his finger trace along the lace, with a growing desire building. 

"Sebastian..." Aeryn reached out to pull him closer again, but he caught her hands, holding them away to look. Why would he rush this, when she had clearly bought it for him to see her in? 

"Surely you meant me to look at you, _ban-maiseach_." 

"Well, that was before you put yourself on display and I had to nearly knife that Leary woman to get her eyes off of you." 

That distracted him from the view. "What?" 

Aeryn rolled her eyes at his baffled expression. "You've no idea? Sebastian." A lecture in the prim tone. 

_Oh_. Well. It was the Maker's blessing that dedication to his craft had tuned his body as well as his mind. He couldn't help a small smile and she laughed fully. "You do know it, too. Temptation itself when you draw that bow...all tightly focused intensity, every muscle in your body splendidly taut...that _look_ on your face, my darling man...and then you walk all loose and smooth..." Her murmurs interspersed with kisses to his chest and her teeth, Holy Beloved, against his nipples and tugs that divested him of the remaining barriers to her pursuit as she pressed him back towards the neatly made bed. Aeryn slipped her foot behind his and tripped him down to the feather mattress, landing straddled across his hips, pinning him. Such a lovely baited trap.

"She was practically drooling. And I can't blame her a bit." Aeryn framed his face with her hands and then leaned in to press a lingering, soul searing kiss to his lips, her tongue slick and enticing, drawing him in to play and duel. He let his hands drift to loosen her laces and with a swivel of her hips she was delightfully naked, but for the scraps of silken confectionery that covered her breasts. 

Sebastian felt the blood rushing and the pulse in his cock and when she ground down against him he groaned again. And as she lifted and rocked, impaling her self and dropping slowly he captured her gaze with his, watching her eyes fill with smoke. "And jealous were you, then?" 

"Nooo...oh." She rolled her hips sweetly, taunting, and he arched to meet her. "I know who you…ah…belong to, my own." 

"Yours alone." 

"Hmm." A smile curved on her lips like a cat in cream as her pace increased and he ran one hand down, between her breasts, down the creamy taut stomach and two silvery scars under her ribs that marked the remnant of a battle, into the damp, darkly copper curls to find her pearl and slid his finger just...ah, there as her breath hitched and she moaned, her hips circling to entice him and increase the pressure. 

Sebastian caught her hips, slowing her just a little. He had no interest in barreling through this joyful moment. 

And he watched her. Watched her as she rode him, taking her pleasure, letting his hips rise to meet her, to match her. Her head fell back, leaving her white throat open, vulnerable. 

He gripped her hips, too tightly and knowing that tomorrow she would brush the marks with fond fingers and when she looked back up at him her eyes would be smoked silver. He thrust up and her pace increased, faster and he felt her tighten, clench, holding him in a velvet embrace, “ _Sebastian_..."

"So tight, wet...Maker, you're _glorious, anam-chara_. So, _ah_..." He found her clit again and circled, circled and she shattered around him with a wordless cry and he couldn't resist the clutching, fluttering, scalding heat that drew him into bliss. 

Later, wrapped around her in the golden light of the afternoon, Sebastian nuzzled her neck where the red hair was curling now, in ringlets dark with sweat. "Did you really cut your hair because of that demon?"

She snuggled closer and smiled against his chest. "You heard that? I wouldn't have thought you'd be listening."

"I find it difficult to not listen to you, _a ruin_. You've the loveliest voice, low and sweet." 

Aeryn blinked at him, eyes a little wide. "I don't...I didn't know you thought that." The lingering flush from their loving brightened a little and he couldn't resist chasing it with his lips across her cheekbones and to the tips of her ears.

Did she not? Had he never told her? Well..."Like music, little wild bird. But don't distract me, I want to know about this." Sebastian ran his fingers through the silken strands and she hummed, happily as he rubbed against the bone behind her ear.

"Oh...well, yes. I cut it again. Mother asked me to grow it out after she got her title back. I think she thought I might...I don't know...settle down, not need to fight so much. I tried it. But, then that shade got a hold of it. It wasn't sensible." 

"I'm glad I made the shot, then. But do you not worry now?" Sebastian wouldn't deny the visions he'd had of it, someday long enough to brush her shoulders, spill across her breasts, but not if it put her at danger, considering her close up style of fighting. 

Shrugging, Aeryn admitted. "Sometimes, but it's fine, Sebastian. I like it longer, time for a change, I think. And now I have you beside me, to make those impossible shots. I...I didn't think I would...before." 

The wing of old grief shadowed her face and Sebastian wanted to chase it away. He caught her chin, pinning her with a loving gaze.

"Always," he promised, his eyes glowing like banked coals, and Aeryn gave him another soft, lingering kiss. It seemed to her sometimes Sebastian could dispel almost any gloom, with that inner fire of his, the light he carried. 

>>>\----- >

A week after the nameday dinner, long before dawn had broken, Bethany was banging frantically on the door to Sebastian and Aeryn's palace quarters. "Aeryn!"

She rolled to her feet, dagger in hand, and instantly awake at the terrified tone in her sister's voice. "Beth? What?!" Sebastian lifted his head from the down pillows blearily and shook himself aware.

Bethany burst through the door, her hair wet and her robes half unbelted. "She's gone!"

"What ?!"

"Macie's gone! I checked in on her on my way back from the bath, she had a little sore throat last night, and she's gone, Aeryn. Here." Bethany handed Aeryn a scrap of paper torn from the chapbook Varric had helped Macie make to practice her writing in.

**Hawke, Got plans. You said I was free to go when it was safe. Don't want to be your pet. Thanks, Macie.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Author’s Note: Zulija here at ff.net has a nifty interpretation of Sebastian and Aeryn, and I have it up at my tumblr. Same name, shadoedseptmbr, look for tag #shelterverseart_  
>  Thank you so much, zulija!  
> 


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Author’s Note: Early post in honor of Thanksgiving, here in the States. Warning for a mention of capital punishment. Thanks to mille libri for her beta!_
> 
>  
> 
> _Bioware owns all, I’m just happy to play in the sandbox!_

**Hawke, Got plans. You said I was free to go when it was safe. Don't want to be your pet. Thanks, Macie.**

The girl had written Aeryn's and her own name neatly and with due care, though the rest of the note was a childish scrawl. Sebastian reading over her shoulder as he tucked her robe around her made a distressed noise low in his throat. "Aeryn, we have to go find her!"

Aeryn glanced up from the note, a certain hesitation in her voice. "I don't..."

Sebastian felt shock lance across him and anger right after. What could she mean?

Aeryn saw it and raised her hand, to make him pause. "No, I mean of course we will. But I _did_ tell her she could go and if she doesn't want..."

But that had just been Aeryn trying to make Macie comfortable in their company, he'd thought. "She's a child, Aeryn! She's not old enough to decide what's best for her." Fierce gray eyes met his, but her voice was soothing.

"Macie's young, Sebastian, but she's not a child. She's been on her own too long to call her that." Aeryn jerked her chin. "Beth, go sound the alarm, please?"

"Alright, sister." The mage left in a swirl of loosely belted robe.

"She needs..."

"I _do_ intend to look for her, Sebastian. Get dressed." Aeryn had gone suddenly cool and Sebastian watched, confused for a moment, but she just yanked a tunic out of the trunk and tossed it his way before finding one of her own. They dressed silently, Aeryn leaving the room without a glance back before he'd finished lacing his boots.

They went into the small room that had been Macie's. It was neat, but mainly because there weren't many things there. She hadn't been with them long enough to accumulate possessions. There was a scattering of shiny pebbles, a snail shell, and a few colorful feathers she'd picked up here and there on the window sill. A hump of pillows pretending to be a girl in the middle of the small cot drew Sebastian's eye and he touched the pillow at the head, with a soft brush of fingers.

Aeryn surreptitiously watched him with a sinking heart as she looked through Macie's nearly empty clothes press. He had grown to care for the scamp and now she'd disappeared on them. No matter what Aeryn felt herself - and there was more than a little relief mixed in with her concern - she'd have to look for Macie.

The small chest that had held Macie's stash was open and empty except for Roget's dagger. Aeryn had meant to sell it off, but they hadn't had a chance after Alistair had engaged them in the search for assassins. "Well, at least she won't starve. And she took her winter gear. She has sense, anyway."

"Small comfort, I'm afraid." Sebastian said quietly. He glanced out the open window and Aeryn followed him.

Pointing at the ironwork on the window next to them, she sketched out Macie's likely descent. "Down that and it's just a little drop to the balcony outside the library. And then, she could have shimmied down the trellis into the garden. Not a bad trick." Aeryn was a little impressed. In the dark, and with the damp chill in the air, it would have taken a bit of courage to make that first grab for the ironwork.

Hearing the tone of her words, Sebastian looked at her. "And then into the dark, out in a city she barely knows?" He was reeling, and he'd admit a little hurt, from the idea that she'd just left. Macie had seemed to be settling nicely, until Aeryn had mentioned schooling.

"Adventure, you know." Aeryn was wearing a half, rather wistful, smile. As though she might have followed Macie on her escapade, given the chance.

He chided, "Until she finds herself in the hands of another like Roget. Or worse."

Aeryn's eyes flashed beneath her lashes. "Well, there's that, yes. C'mon, I don't see anything here to help us."

It took a precious half mark to organize a search, first in the palace and then spiraling out into the surrounding town.

-000-

Harry, their page and Macie's nearest thing to a chum, had been completely surprised. "She seemed to like it here well enough. Though…"

"What, lad?"

He scuffed his toe against the rug before he looked up, green eyes a little worried. "She didn't like it, when she found out you were going to have her join the rest of us at lessons. She didn't say anything about running away, though, m'lady, I swear. Just that...she didn't have to stay and be ordered around like…well, we allowed ourselves to be, the rest of us." Harry listed off the places that he'd shown Macie, the little alcoves and hidden play spaces that children always managed to find.

"Thanks, Harry. If you or the others think of anything else, let us know, please." Aeryn watched the boy go. Sebastian's voice jarred her into movement again.

"You shouldn't have told her as you did, Aeryn. We should have thought of another, gentler way." There was something like blame in his voice and Aeryn felt her hackles rise, defensively.

"Perhaps you could have mentioned that earlier?" Distracted by his worry, Sebastian failed to notice the clipped nature of her words. Aeryn was moving and off to seek out anyone else who might know something and he was left to scramble behind her.

Alistair made the situation known to the Guard, but Aeryn axed their outright help.

"Macie won't see the guard as anything but a threat, I'd guess." The slightly amused expression on her face made Sebastian frown, inwardly. He accepted it was true, but somehow it seemed wrong to turn down help from any quarter.

"Well, still. I'll send a note to the Sergeant at Arms for the city. He can at least make sure if Macie turns up caught for stealing that she's brought back here instead of taken to Fort Drakon or to the Arl's keep. Neither of those are fit for children, really."

"Thank you, Alistair." Sebastian acknowledged, gratefully.

Alistair waved him off, "Well, these things...I always wondered how children survived on the street. I never could have."

Aeryn smirked a little. "Well, children of Macie's aptitude and inclination do alright, if truth be known." Sebastian frowned at her and Aeryn shifted, uncomfortable under his disapproving gaze. Void, it's not like Macie was some little princess who couldn't find her own nose. She'd been a street urchin for years, leaving the Chantry where she'd been housed as an orphan by the time she was six.

Dierdre spoke softly. "It may help to have the servants notified as well. They always seem to know the best kept secrets and ours are very discreet." Aeryn acknowledged the queen's assistance with a nod. Not a bad plan. Servants knew how to watch, unobserved. Someone might have seen something.

Fenris' shoulder twitched and caught Aeryn's eye. "We should check the dockside. Slavers would..."

Alistair interrupted him. "There are no slavers in Denerim."

Aeryn arched a brow. That was a pretty blanket statement. Tevinter slavers respected no boundaries, as far as she knew. "Alistair..."

He shook his head. "I make sure of it, Hawke. Tevinter and Orlesian ships that come into port here are subject to search before they leave. And that includes ships that stop in _their_ ports. We had a problem during the Blight, Loghain allowed slavers into the alienage to finance his civil war after the nobles started rebelling. In order to ensure that the Tevinters didn't make any assumptions about that continuing, I put in some pretty harsh requirements for any ships coming in. Foreign ships are thoroughly inspected by elves set in place by Bann Shianni. And last year I hung three Tevinter citizens in the courtyard, one of whom was a magister's son. We divided their profits among the victims and set the ship on fire in the harbor."

Aeryn looked wide-eyed at the king, grimfaced and solid in his seat behind his desk. "Ah. I think I might have the answer to why bloodmages might be after you, Alistair."

He nodded, acknowledging that it was likely. Smiling, just a little, he added. "Well, if the Tevinters aren't mad at you for something, you're probably going wrong somewhere."

Fenris' laugh cracked through the wide room.

-000-

Between the crew, they could quarter the city. Varric and Isabela turned out the underworld contacts they had. Isabela, in particular, was concerned about the brothel. "I don't think Sanga would take an underage whore, but I'll check it out."

Just before she left though, Isabela pulled Aeryn aside into one of the broad stairwells, allowing the others to walk ahead of them. "You know, sweet thing, we aren't going to find her if she doesn't want us to."

Sighing, Aeryn nodded. "I know. But...Maker, 'Bela. What else can I do? Sebastian's beside himself."

"He's going to have to get used to the fact that he can't bat those eyes of his and have his whole world fall into place." Isabela smirked. "Just because he tamed one wild child doesn't mean the rest of them are his to command."

"Look tamed, do I?"

The warm golden gaze gave her a familiar and somehow comforting leer and Aeryn posed for a minute, channeling her old sullen sultry self. "Look? No. Sound? 'Oh, Sebastian, oh, please...'" Isabela whined, in a fair imitation.

Aeryn sniffed. "I dare say you'd beg, too...no, no, never mind. No dare! I take it back!" when Isabela's whole face lit up with wicked glee. They stifled laughs and Aeryn sighed again, sobering.

"Sebastian's pretty sodding aware that the world is a hard place, pirate. I think that's the problem."

Isabela shrugged. "I'll check out the brothels. Sanga'll know which ones deal in the dark stuff. But after that, I'm done unless you find some sign she's in trouble." The pirate glanced over her shoulder to the shadowy palace halls. "Count on me to keep an eye on the queen, while you all are busy, though. I owe Alistair a favor for hooking me up with his shipwright."

"Yeah. Alright. Thanks, 'Bela." And wouldn't it be nice if Aeryn could just ignore Macie unless there was some proof of trouble, too?

Sebastian couldn't find anything to complain about in Aeryn's efforts nor her clear concern. But as they fruitlessly searched, he also realized that the majority of her concern was for him. Now and again as they set their plans, he had looked up to see her bright eyes on him, considering. It irked him, to be honest, that she was spending her energy on him rather than the missing Macie.

When he and Bethany split away from her and Fenris, Sebastian was almost glad, but it was a fruitless conversation with the sisters. The Revered Mother was in a conference with the Grand Cleric and could not be disturbed for a lost child. They were allowed to question the mother in charge of the children in the Chantry's care, but to no avail. She'd not seen Macie. Bethany, usually a dab hand with children, had taken the older children aside. With a shake of her dark head, though, the mage had indicated that they'd been no help.

Sebastian took a moment to breathe in the incense, light a candle, and whisper a prayer that Macie might have a change of heart before she found herself in trouble.

Where was the foolish child, then? He'd been independent enough to try and run away in his childhood, like many. An hour or two and he'd been convinced he'd starve to death and gone home. The last time Sebastian had tried he'd been eleven, before his eldest brother's wedding. It was a full free afternoon, rummaging through the marketplace and almost to the city walls before the guard had found him. His father had had him beaten for causing his mother grief (though Sebastian didn't see that she'd taken any notice, other than he'd missed his fitting and the rehearsal) and his grandfather had given him a lecture on duty to one's family. The old man had been grim and the shame of _that_ had caught Sebastian's attention more than the lashing.

But there would be none of that for Macie if...no, when she returned. Certainly no beating and Sebastian didn't fool himself that their ward held either he or Aeryn in such regard that a shaming lecture would bear much weight.

Sebastian emerged from the dim, warm Chantry, into the brighter, chilly forecourt, to see Aeryn plying a small group of street children with treats and coin, trying to bribe a bit of information from them while Fenris did his best to appear less menacing. A few of the children were far more interested in his tattoos and, though the warrior looked uncomfortable, he was trying to talk to them in hopes of loosening their tongues.

"Heya, ser? Does them marks, does they help you lift that big sword?"

"Ah. That is not their function, no. I had training to wield my broadsword."

"Couple of the kni...urm, elvish folk in the Alienage, they got them marks, too, but they ain't shiny-like."

"Those are _vallaslin_ , they are tattoos of the Dalish. Made with ink."

"Does your kin all have them...tah-toos, too? Hey! I made a rhyme!"

"Oh, you're a rhyme." The children broke into a scuffle and Fenris was forced to raise his voice.

"No. Mine are...different. They were not given to me by my family."

A girl with a tumble of cornsilk curls looked up at him and said, "I betcha a scary old witch gave 'em to you 'cause they made you pretty and then she disappeared like smoke and you have to help protect her from Templars whenever she calls you!"

"That is not where they came from, no." Fenris tried rather desperately to draw Hawke's attention, but she was still trying to wheedle a bit of information from the older children and completely ignored his plight. If Sebastian hadn't been quite so worried about Macie, he might have had to tease Fenris just a little about the elf's huge, imploring eyes. Bethany giggled beside him.

From the sound of protests, the older children were swearing to a soul that they'd seen no sign of a girl like Macie. Aeryn didn't look like she quite believed them. He caught her eye with a wave and Sebastian was a little taken aback at the look she gave him, frustrated and wary.

Sighing, Aeryn acknowledged their presence and took Bethany's shrugged shoulders as a sign that the Chantry had been bare. She'd had little hope that Macie had taken up with the Mothers, but it had been sensible to ask. If the guard had caught her, the girl might have been brought here by a sympathetic believer, rather than cast into Drakon.

This lot knew something, she thought. But it would take more than a smattering of coin and sweets to pull it from the streetwise bunch so quickly and Aeryn didn't really want to intimidate them.

Finally, Aeryn gave up. Fenris seemed to heave a sigh of relief as she untangled him from his knot of admirers and they joined Sebastian and Bethany, standing near the garden by the Chantry wall.

She eyed Sebastian, who looked drawn and worried, and swallowed a sigh. "We should go back to the palace, see if anyone's found a trace."

He nodded and they followed her across the bridge. Sebastian was brooding, his lips set and a small wrinkle at the bridge of his nose. Grim and stark, it really was appalling how attractive it was. She could feel the growing impulse to speak coming off him and nudged, "What, then?"

"You shouldn't have given her the coin, Aeryn. If Macie hadn't..."  
Aeryn resisted the impulse to swallow and look away. "She'd be gone anyway and with no stake. She'd have had her hand in someone's pocket before she left the courtyard." Though Macie probably had anyway, just to prove to herself she hadn't lost any of her skill. Six would get you seven that Macie would just prowl Denerim for a night or two and they'd find her curled up in her bed in a few days. Still, strange city and all. Winter coming on. And Denerim, despite being the king's seat, had its reputation as a rough place. And they really never had gotten a good handle on the blood mages. It was even possible that someone had seen her as another way to get in to the king's circle. Flames.

Back at the palace, Isabela had sent word with Varric that a ship had left port for Cumberland with two new cabin boys, one of whom could have been Macie, by description. "And, Hawke, there were two dwarven caravans heading out this morning. One to Redcliffe and the other to Highever. Kid could have signed on as a hand. She's eager and quick enough. Dwarves hire human children pretty readily. Still have reach on them."

Aeryn saw Sebastian deflate and it wrenched her heart. Impulsively, she said, "We'll go. We'll split up and...I'll charter a ship. We'll get to Cumberland and keep looking."

"Hawke, you can't..." Varric started but stopped when she shot him a quelling glance, raising his hands. "Sure you can. Do what you want. You generally do, anyway."

She bloody well could, if it meant taking that look off of Sebastian's face. And to shake the knot of regret and shame that had tightened in her stomach. The fact that none of them had found any sort of good sign at all made her nervous.

"D'ya really think she's gone there?" Sebastian's usually warm voice was flat and defeated sounding. Aeryn leaned against the window frame and shrugged.

"No...if Macie's left the city, she likely went with one of the caravans and we can catch up, they'll be slowed with wagons and all. But if we leave it too late, we'll lose her, for sure. We need to go now."

"But you think she might be here and just doesna want to be found?" Void, he sounded so confused. Aeryn tried to explain.

"I...if it were me, I'd have taken the caravan. She still had a stash in Amaranthine, she may be trying to get there. Or, maybe she lied. Maybe she had family somewhere. I..."

Merrill asked, "But, Hawke, why? The poor little girl, she had a good thing here with you, why would she?" Sebastian wondered the same thing, grateful to Merrill for voicing it.

Aeryn was rueful when she answered. "I would have." Fenris and Varric nodded. "I wouldn't have...She doesn't want school work and such, she wants to be a thief. If someone had taken me and made me mind and kept me from thieving? After years of being on my own? I'd have run, too. Admit it, Sebastian. When you were a boy? Wouldn't you have rather gone off on your own?"

Her question echoed his earlier thoughts. Of course he had. More than once. But, "Then why did we make her do such things?" He meant it somewhat rhetorically - he'd been the one concerned about her learning new techniques - but Aeryn answered him.

It was too much. Suddenly Aeryn was very tired of this...vulnerability. How easy it was for Sebastian to hurt her. Walls she'd thought she'd abandoned slammed into place, old defenses. She snapped, "You'd rather I just threw her into the street to steal? 'Well, young miss, your quota is six silver a day or I'll have your hide.' Even _I_ think ten is a _bit_ young for baby's first lesson in throat slitting. Though, what else do I have to teach her, really?" Bitter twist of a smile on her lips.

Caught up in the heat of the moment, Aeryn didn't notice Bethany's eyes lock on her sister's face at her acid comment. If she had, Aeryn would have noticed that her sister's gaze was as Hawke-like as the man who had earned the moniker, taking it to replace the last name the Circle had stolen.

Sebastian breathed in, shocked. "Aeryn. I didn't mean..."

But Aeryn was still speaking, her voice gone sharp and cutting, and Sebastian flinched at the implication. "She needs schooling, training. Maybe she'll make a bard. At the very least, a scout for the army. Better than I managed. You wanted her and I brought her and I was following how I was being taught, _before_. What else was I supposed to do?"

Aeryn had crossed to the other side of the study while Sebastian paced by the door. It was unusual, as they normally simply gravitated towards one another, and it was her distance most of all, that made him take notice as she gazed out the window into the crisp late autumn afternoon, rubbing her brow as though to rid herself of a headache.

Fenris frowned at him from where he leaned against the next broad sill and Sebastian looked at his lover closely. Aeryn's shoulders were slightly hunched, her lip was chewed half-raw and she'd wrapped an arm around her waist, protectively. Suddenly startled out of his concern for Macie, Sebastian cast his thoughts back over the day. Maker. Had he truly been accusing Aeryn of neglect since Bethany woke them?

"Oh, _leannan_. I'm sorry. I swear I didn't mean...I know. You were trying to do right by her." He crossed the room to slip his arm around her waist.

Something like a shudder ran through her and she stayed stiff. For just a moment, Sebastian thought Aeryn might jerk away from him. It took a minute before she relaxed enough to look up and he winced at the cool, flat, reserve in her eyes.

Aeryn twitched her shoulder, accepting the apology. He hadn't meant to, she knew. He'd just been worried and out of sorts. It was fine. And she _should_ be more worried. "We should go. Ah...Varric could you and Bethany and Fenris take the Redcliffe caravan and Merrill and I will head towards Highever."

"I'll..." But Aeryn cut him off, with a shake of her head. Business.

"You've got that meeting with the ambassador from Cumberland in the morning. We might not be back in time. And some of us need to stay, in case Macie comes back and to keep an eye on the queen."

"I don't want..." How could she think he'd go to a meeting and leave her to search alone?

"Well, Alistair did request your presence."

And that was so. Alistair had been particularly interested in having him, since Sebastian had known the ambassador's family. He nodded, reluctantly.

"I swear I'll find her, Sebastian. If she'll let me." Aeryn pressed her small hand against his chest.  
That reserve was still there, though, in the stormy gray eyes. Aeryn might have accepted his apology but she was still hurt, still holding herself aloof. "I know you will, Aeryn. I do." He covered her hand with his own and squeezed.

Aeryn ducked her head, breaking eye contact, uncomfortable with his earnest regard. She'd have to find Macie, to make up for her own lack, her inability to make the girl content enough to stay.

She pulled away from him and Sebastian felt the loss of her like a lash. "Let's get our gear."

Fenris cocked his head at the archer as he followed his partner out the door. Sebastian looked a little hollow as he watched Hawke leave without a backwards glance. Fenris caught up to her as she adjusted the scabbards across her back, before climbing the stairs.

"I should come with..."

"No... I want Bethany with you and Varric. I need to know _you've_ got her back, if I can't, Fenris. Merrill and I can travel pretty fast and quiet together."

"As you like, then." He paused for a moment, "Hawke..."

"Yeah?"

"I think Sebastian regrets...He was..." _Venhedis_ , it was some sort of joke that he found himself as the mediator between these two again. But Hawke took pity on him, this time.

"Was only worried and tense with it? I know. I also know that I'm probably not concerned enough...but really, what can I do? I can't keep a guard on her the whole time. If she's done a runner once, she'll certainly try again. I don't know how to make her _want_ to stay if she doesn't want what we have to offer."

"You should perhaps say that to him."  
Admit to the man who wants you to raise a family with him that you haven't the foggiest idea how to deal with children beyond bribes and the occasional job? Oh, well. "I don't know, Fenris. Let's just make our arrangements and find her."

-000-

Back in the study, Sebastian watched Aeryn walk away from him, the line of her spine like one of her blades.

He ducked into their room and pulled out his pack and hers as well, their gear starting to mix together instead of staying neatly separate in their personal trunks. Meeting or not, he was going with her. Not about to let her leave him behind, when he'd hurt her.

Aeryn had gone to the kitchens to arrange for travel rations with Cook before she came to their room to pack, only to pause at the door. Sebastian was folding one of his new woolen tunics into the rucksack he liked to carry. Her own was set out next to his on the bed, as if he'd taken it out when he dug his out of the truck and laid it to air while he worked.

It was like him, to be that thoughtful on her account. But if he was packing, too, he didn't think she'd find Macie without him. She did her best to ignore that cold chill curling up in the back of her mind, that Sebastian didn't trust her. And that he was probably right not to do so.

"I thought we agreed you'd stay for your meeting and to watch Dierdre." She spoke quietly, padding up behind him like she'd considered sneaking past. He turned, dropping his extra trews onto the open packs.

"I want to help."

She nodded as she tucked a pair of knitted stockings into her pack. "I know…but this is important, isn't it? That you make these ties? It would insult the ambassador if he's been notified that you were meant to be in the meeting, which would do you no favors, later."

Sebastian slumped a little. He'd been the one to explain that, when he was telling her about the politics of the Marches. "Yes, but…Aeryn..."

"If she's in the caravan, Sebastian, I will find her." Aeryn kept her voice level, but it was unnaturally soft and formal. And she hadn't looked at him, once. Just kept packing.

Maker, she'd taken the fact that he wanted to go as a lack of faith in her. Enough of this. Sebastian reached out and pulled her to him, his hand tipping her chin up and letting his fingers stroke the soft skin at her throat, soothingly. Counting on touch to get her to open up to him. "I _know_ that. Aeryn. Believe me, _mo chridhe_. I'm sorry for before." He pressed a kiss to her forehead, cupping her face. But she was still avoiding his eyes, the red lashes brushing her pale cheeks, and she pulled away to sling her bag across her shoulder.

"We'll be back by mid morning. Merrill and I can make triple the time that any bunch of merchants and their oxen can."

"Aeryn, stop please? Wait. Look at me." Sebastian felt a small trickle of panic at the way she was keeping herself set apart from him.

She didn't want to. Some part of Aeryn wanted to stay hurt, build it up with anger and use that to hide away the honest truth that she didn't know how to deal with Macie. But… a note of fear in his voice made her pull up. It was a petty thing she was doing, she knew.

Aeryn stopped just before she got to the door, did as he asked, and Sebastian sucked in a relieved breath as he wrapped his arms around her from behind. He held her for a moment before he whispered.

"I canna let you go from me hurting, _leannan_. What is it, tell me how I can fix it, please."

"I'm alright, Sebastian."

"And that's a lie. Dinna...please talk to me, Aeryn." He tried to pull her down with him to sit in the armchair they kept facing to the fire. A warm place to sit and tug your boots on in the morning after they'd warmed on the hearth. Aeryn resisted his pull, though, and Sebastian had to settle for holding onto her hand. He rubbed her fingers, thumb brushing across her callused palm.

Maker, fine. If he wants to know so bloody much... "I'm…not hurt." When Sebastian interrupted to object, she had to acknowledge, "Not _only_ hurt, okay? I'm ashamed that...you're right. She's just a little girl. She needs guidance. But I don't know _how_ to make her want to stay with us...I don't want to be her jailor anymore than she wants to be a pet."

Sebastian considered that. "And neither do I…and you're right. We can not put her under lock and key. We aren't her parents and if she willna trust us…well, there's little we can do, no." He pressed a kiss to the side of her hand. "But do we not have to try? At least…maybe she just thinks we don't care enough to do that, even."

Aeryn heard his brogue smooth out as he spoke. "But…I did not mean to shame you, _à ruin_. I don't expect you to know any better than I how to deal with the child."

When Aeryn spoke again, Sebastian thought perhaps she was telling him something she'd only barely admitted to herself.

"I…it's easier for me to think of her as just an apprentice. I know you're attached to her, love. But I'm…it's harder for me. I don't want to…I spent seven years of my life in a city I hated because I didn't want to run out on the friends I made there. I can't…I just can't do it again, so soon. And what are we going to do, take her to fight a war with us?" Snagging her lip in her teeth, she kept her eyes on her booted foot, tracing a swirl of red yarn in the rug's woven pattern with a steel toe.

Sebastian stared at the fire, crackling in the wide hearth, just a little shocked. He knew she'd been reluctant to take Macie on, but it had never occurred to him that she might hold the girl at arms length to protect herself. Aeryn, who had taken half of Kirkwall under her wing. And where had it left her?

Aeryn could see the astonishment. Oh. She smoothed her face and tried to stand, ignoring the lump in her throat. She needed to be on the road.

Sebastian, realizing she was trying to get away again, hummed, softly. "Give me a moment, Aeryn. I dinna want to say the wrong thing, again. Alright?"

She nodded, reluctantly giving him his time. Sebastian gazed at her as he considered. She looked…unhappy and, oh, afraid. Aeryn had been _afraid_ this whole time of telling him how she really felt about taking Macie on and he'd insisted on it, adding a burden to her just as she thought she'd freed herself from being responsible for other people. Maker, forgive him. 

"I didn't stop to think, Aeryn, how this felt to you. I didn't know you were…You have to _tell_ me, _mo chridhe_. I cannot read your mind, though Maker knows, it would be a useful gift." 

His brogue, warm and rolling, brought her eyes to his face. Sebastian was solemn and when he reached out for her again, Aeryn finally went willingly to him, settling on his lap. Leaning his forehead against the top of her dark auburn hair, he breathed in the rich scent of almonds, letting it relax him.

"It doesn't really matter, now, Sebastian. I brought Macie along because it was necessary to protect her and I _do_ need to find her, at least to make sure she's not into something over her head. If she wants to come back, well…I guess we'll figure out a way to make it work."

"I don't know, Aeryn. But we have to, if she'll let us. And as for taking her along with us into a war…I have a thought or two I'm pondering about Starkhaven. Maybe a way to gain her without a brawling, damaging fight." He saw curiosity flash in her eyes, chasing away the clouds.

"What?" But he shook his head.

"No, now. I'm not quite ready. It's an idea that still needs banging about in my head a little longer. I promise if I decide anything, you'll be the next to know." It was Varric and his storyteller's mind he needed to pick, to see if it was viable at all.

Aeryn nodded, though curiosity was prodding her. She rested against his broad chest, a little lighter for having told him one of the gnawing things that had been building in her. And the others? No, not now. There was still Macie to find, while she lazed here, sheltered in her archer's strong arms.

"I need to go, Sebastian."

"I know." He tightened his arm around her, though, and nuzzled against her cheek until she turned her head to kiss him sweetly. Sebastian ran the fingers of his free hand into her hair to rub at the bone behind her ear and the back of her neck. She arched into the loving touch, craving the solace after a day of holding herself apart from him.

Aeryn's lips were soft and full, warm as honey in the sun, and Sebastian thought he might be content to sit here, trading gentle kisses and murmuring apologies and love words next to the crackling fire until they were old and grey, but the world and its troubles were calling to them.

Sighing against his mouth, Aeryn finally whispered, "Promise me you'll sleep tonight? _In_ the bed?" The sight of it, comfortable and inviting over his shoulder, had reminded her of Sebastian's earlier declaration about not wanting to sleep comfortably without her next to him.

_"I..."_

_"Sebastian. Don't make me worry for you, love. Promise."_

_"Alright, then. But..." Sebastian pressed another kiss to her temple. "What of you? Does Merrill know how to wake you if..."_

_"I don't dream when I camp, usually. And the two of us like to walk in the dark. We may not bother." Aeryn brushed her thumb against his cheekbone and he leaned into the caress. With a wry little smile, she continued, "You eventually have to let go, Sebastian. Every minute takes the caravans farther down the road and I'm sure the others are ready by now."_

_But they hadn't spent a night apart since he'd woken in her bed, back in Kirkwall, and Sebastian was dreading it. Finally, he dragged his hands away. "My prayers go with you, _mo chridhe_ , always. Be safe. Be careful."_

_Reluctantly, Aeryn pushed herself to her feet and bent to adjust the lay of the laces of her boots. "Careful as I can be, beloved. And you as well. We've no guarantee that Gaven's death was the end of the assassins," she reminded him. The hanging had taken place the day before, in the misting chill of the early morning. Aeryn had attended and stood impassively next to Sebastian as he whispered prayers for the condemned man's soul. He had observed a few such punishments as Elthina's aide, but it was the first time for Aeryn, since the army. Hanging was a common enough end for a thief. She'd rather die at the end of a blade. Aeryn had welcomed Varric's invitation to drinks at the Gnawed Noble, afterwards. A bit of noise, a raucous card game and a pint had been a good antidote to the pervading gloom._

_"Isabela and I can manage," Sebastian assured her as he turned her to adjust the scabbards across her back and to smooth a wrinkle in her sleeve under the shoulder of her jerkin. It always rode up there and left a rubbed red mark on her skin. She gave him a soft, sidelong smile for his fussing and he touched the dimple in her cheek, with a light stroke of his fingers._

_"I've no doubt of that, my love. Watch your back, though."_

_"I always do, around Isabela." He grinned at her and they walked hand in hand to the courtyard to meet up with the rest of her mad, merry band._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _AN: Just a head’s up. Next week’s chapter will probably be delayed as I will be out of pocket for most of this week. The next few chapters will be shorter, as I finish up another project._


	12. Chapter 12

The road to Highever was well-paved and tended, unlike most of the other sections of the Tevinter roads that still traversed Ferelden, last lingering signs of the Empire's long reach.  Still, Merrill and Aeryn, by mutual agreement, took the forested path that ran just below the raised roadway.  Both to avoid undue attention and because the trees were lovely, clinging to the last of their autumn glory in the filtered light of the afternoon. The dampened dirt path swallowed the sounds of their feet, rendering them utterly silent.  

 

They loped along quietly for an hour, as Merrill made note of several plants she wanted to transfer to Alistair's rose garden and Aeryn, while ostensibly taking point, mused about what had occurred earlier.  

 

About an hour into their journey, the elf spoke up.  "I hadn't thought it possible, really."

 

Jarred from her daydreaming, Aeryn wondered if she'd missed part of the conversation.  "What's that, Merrill?"

 

"That...he would have listened to her.  The king, I mean.  Alistair.  I...oh, this sounds terrible...it's just...He went to such  _lengths_  to give Lyna a resting place.  He told me that he even tried once or twice to contact Marethari.  To make sure he'd done rightly.  But she'd left Ferelden, of course."  A brief shadow crossed Merrill's fine-boned face and she stopped to lean against the bole of an old birch tree, fiddling with the peeling bark.

 

Aeryn tipped her head and considered.  They needed to be getting on, but it had been a while since she and Merrill had chatted about anything heavier than potion ingredients.  Aeryn had avoided her after the slaughter on Sundermount and even on the boat they had been careful of one another.  "And why wouldn't he?  He loved her."  Loves her still, by every indication.

 

Merrill had picked up a small flake of the birchbark and was folding a cup.  She watched her fingers make creases as she'd seen Lyna do a thousand times in their childhood.  "Sometimes...sometimes it seems to me that people who say they love you don't always listen very well.  They just want what's easiest or best for them."

 

Ah.  "It's not really...love, then.  Is it?"

 

Fathomless hazel eyes fixed on Aeryn.  "You listened.  You helped me...even when...when you didn't want to.  When you thought I was wrong."

 

The wan smile that crossed Hawke's lips made Merrill ache again to take back what had happened on Sundermount.  She'd caused her friend terrible grief that day.  "Did I do you that big a favor, Merrill?  Maybe if I'd..."

 

But Merrill shook her head.  "I'd have done it anyway, on my own and alone and if it  _had_  worked...maybe no one would have been there to stop me...if..."  She handed Aeryn the delicate cup.  "I never said thank you.  I just...I wanted to do that."  They heard the stream just beyond the rise and Merrill followed Aeryn's careful steps down lichen covered rocks to the icy water.  They christened the little cup, Merrill dribbling a few drops of the water, sweetened by the birch, and murmuring a quick prayer to June and to Mythal.  

 

The path curved away along the stream and just past a large boulder and down the rise there was a large opening into a cave.  A scent of earth and stone breathed away from it as they passed and Aeryn's shoulders prickled.  She turned to consider it.  Merrill, with just a hint of resignation, started to draw up her mana to cast a few protective spells.

 

"No.  Don't."  Aeryn shook her head.  "C'mon.  Let's just go."

 

Merrill raised her eyebrows. "Really?  You're passing up the dark, spooky, probably quite haunted cave?  What will Varric say?"

 

Aeryn chuckled.  "That I'm developing sense at a terribly late age?  It's just the two of us.  And we need to find Macie quickly, if possible."

 

"Still..."  It was very unlike the always curious Hawke and Merrill couldn't help but be concerned.

 

"You know how this part of Ferelden is.  It's probably full of tainted rats and spiders, and this close to Denerim all the treasures that would make it fun have been stripped twice over.  Or it could just be a bear's den.  I've no quarrels with bears.  Especially one who's trying to pad himself for winter."  Hawke's grin reassured Merrill.

 

"Oh, you _have_ changed, Hawke."

 

"Well, it wasn't possible for me to grow more reckless than I was when you met me, kitten."

 

"Is that why...you didn't have to keep visiting me, after you brought me to Kirkwall.  Is that why you did?  You were reckless and looking for excitement?"

 

"No.  Honestly, Merrill...it was just you had a right to choose your path.  I admit...since I'd brought you into the city, I did think it was a good idea to keep tabs on you.  But, you know I adore you, right?"  Aeryn stopped Merrill with a hand on the elf's elbow and squeezed.   Merrill nodded and Aeryn slipped her arm around her slim friend for a hug.  

 

The Tevinter highway dipped closer to the forest floor just ahead of them and Aeryn took the opportunity to look for traces of the caravan they were following.  The oxen had left their usual leavings and Aeryn estimated they must be four hours behind, still.  It would be past dark by the time they caught up to the merchants.  They picked up their pace.

 

It was another two hours later, having a bit of a break, when Merrill spoke up again.  "If you had magic, you'd have made a good keeper, Hawke.  You always kept us on the path.  I've been thinking...it's...I don't think I was ever meant to be a keeper," she sighed.  "I've always been so ...singleminded.  I start on one thing and I have to chase it and follow.  But I need to ...do something.  I can't always wander."

 

"We'll be settling soon , though."

 

"In Starkhaven.  But that's yours...Sebastian and you and did I ever tell you how glad I am for you that he...But that's not for me, Hawke."

 

"Sebastian says the clans travel through the mountains around Starkhaven, still.  Maybe..." 

 

“I'll always be an outcast, a pariah.  A First who can barely heal scrapes?"  Merrill scoffed. "Less than useless."

 

"Merrill..."

 

"No...I want to be of use, Hawke!  I want to use my magic...but I don't...I need to be around people who won't...who can stop me if I go too far."

 

"You know I would."

 

"Yes, But the day will come when...Sebastian…he’s not like I thought, Hawke.  Before.  He’s been nice to me.  But do you really think he’ll want me around?  I’m not ever going to join a Circle, you know.”

 

And as much as Sebastian had changed, he still believed the Circles had their place.  Aeryn laid her hand on Merrill’s arm. “Merrill, if we start a Circle in Starkhaven…it’s not going to be anything like the Gallows.  Or even Kinloch.  It will be a school or…it won’t be a prison.  I won’t allow it.” 

 

Merrill’s eyes were deep and curious as she tucked her little wooden spade back into her pouch.  “And at your school, will you want me there to teach blood magic?”

 

“That’s not all you do.  That’s not all you’re so very good at and I _know_ that.”  Flaming Void, Merrill had so much talent.  Chaos magic was among the most useful in a fight and Merrill could wield it easily.  If not for that bloody mirror, she’d never have needed to call on demons.

 

“Yes…but…it’s part of me.”

 

“It doesn’t have to rule you.”  Aeryn felt the conversation slip from her grasp.  Merrill had that knack.  Aeryn had lost this one, long ago.

 

“You’re so kind to me, Hawke.  But…it will, someday.  _I_ know _that_ , I’m not stupid.”

 

“I’ve never thought you were.”  Foolish.  Misguided.  But not stupid.

 

 

“I'm thinking...do you think Meridan Caron is like that?  The Warden Commander?"

 

Oh.  Here it comes.  Aeryn took another sip from her water skin before she answered.  "She did seem to be very conscientious of her people.  Now."  It would be a long time before Aeryn could forget it was Caron who had left Anders surrounded by Templars.  Ex-Templars.  But, still.

 

"She said...the Grey Wardens don't care so much...how you fight, so long as you fight.  The darkspawn, I mean."

 

"I think Anders said as much, once,"  Aeryn agreed.

 

Merrill whispered her next words, hesitantly.  "I could be of use to them.  She said."

 

Swallowing the cool water, Aeryn took a deep breath.  "I imagine you could.  Yeah.  Are you trying to tell me you'll be staying in Ferelden, then?  When Sebastian and Fenris and I leave, I mean?"  

 

Eyes cast to the ground, but she nodded.  "I...think so. Yes, Hawke.  Or.. I ...want to help you, the way you helped...tried to help me.  But, I think I'm going to the Wardens."  

 

"Hey."  Aeryn waited until Merrill looked back up.  The sun was starting to sink and it set off the gleam of the elf's skin and the lovely lines of her _vallaslin_.  "You did, Merrill.  You've always helped.  You don't owe me anything.  We're friends, right?  You didn't used to come to the estate to water my plants because you owed me, right?"

 

"No, I did that because you'd forget the poor things."  

 

"Well, then, you do see.  I won't stop you, Merrill, if this is what you want.  But I would remind you that Anders hated being a Warden.  He called it a death sentence, more than once."

 

Merrill shrugged.  "Life is a death sentence,  _lethallan_."  And Aeryn was rather viscerally reminded of Flemeth.  "I want to be of some use, to someone.  There isn't a clan that would have me.  I'd have been a terrible Keeper, barely a healing spell to my name.  And...the Wardens have access to old things...to books and hidden scrolls.  The things I could learn..."  She was staring off into the darkening woods and not far away they heard the call of a wolf to its pack.   The night creatures were starting to move.  

 

"We should be going."  

 

Just after dusk swallowed them, they heard the unmistakable sounds of a caravan coming in on the breeze, along with the stout smell of beasts and stew cooking.  Wagons creaking, oxen bellowing as they were unhitched.  Aeryn touched Merrill’s arm to motion her to quiet and stillness and stepped into the shadows to observe the merchants.  Better to be safe, Aeryn figured.  Just in case Macie had actually chosen to make her way back to Amaranthine this way.  After a few minutes, though, it became quite clear that the whole group was composed of dwarves.  With a sigh, she slipped back to Merrill.  Sebastian would expect to hear that she’d covered all the corners.

 

As Aeryn and Merrill emerged from the trees, they saw the first cart animals being led down one of the wide ramps to graze in the tall grasses that covered the clearing.    

 

The carters just looked at them from beneath their hoods, slow and deliberate as the animals they accompanied.  But the armed guards stepping out of the notch in the wall were less accommodating.  "No trading.  Bound for Highever."

 

Aeryn held her hands out to the scowling dwarf who had addressed her.  "No trading.  Just need a bit of information from your boss."  

 

"Boss don't like strangers."

 

"Even strangers bearing coin?"

 

“Dagun…what’s going on out there?  You gonna talk that bandit to death?”  The question was growled out and the guard answered with a quick tongue.

 

“Ain’t no bandit, Boss.  She says she and her elf want some information.”

 

“Well, send her over then and get on with your patrol.”  The guard pointed them back to the tent the voice had come from and stepped into the dark.  Aeryn held open the flap and Merrill stepped in to the warmer, close air of the tent.  Near a camp desk, a dwarf was seated on a canvas chair stretched over a wooden frame.  His fingers were inkstained, but he had a lovely sword, with a rune marked blade hilted at his side. 

 

“Garrik Cordin at your service.  What do you want?”  He was typically burly, but fair and his blue eyes had something of a twinkle, despite the gruffness in his tone.  Aeryn could see Merrill’s eyes light up at the fellow’s beard, beautifully and elaborately braided.  A proper dwarf to tell Varric about, later.

 

"Messere, I was hoping you could provide us with some information?  About a youngster, human girl about ten.  She’s run off and I thought she might have hired on with you."

 

Cordin looked at her skeptically.  "A kid, Hmm?"  The dwarf grumbled. "Ain't hired no brats. Got no use for 'em.  Too much bother."

 

"This one was quick and smart.  Makes a good runner.  The Prince would pay a fair amount to recover his ward."

 

"Prince?"  Ah, well that had his attention.  Yet another way to spread Sebastian’s claim.

 

"Oh, did I not mention my employer's position at King Alistair's court?"  Aeryn asked with a coy smile and Cordin gave a chuckle.

 

"Missy, I wish I could help you.  There aren't any kids with us, though.”

 

Aeryn shrugged.  Macie wasn’t here.  She’d known that, in all honesty.  But she’d promised to look for her. 

 

The merchant was asking, “Prince of where, anyway?  There ain’t no local princes around here.”

 

“He’s from the Free Marches.  Starkhaven.  Have you been there, is it nice?”  Merrill was being her usual curious self, giving Aeryn a chance to observe.  The change in the dwarf’s face drew her eye.

 

“Starkhaven?  Yeah.  I have actually.  Not too long ago.”  Cordin’s sharp blue eyes were narrowed.  “Prince Goran hasn’t left the city in years, hear tell.   What makes this kid so special to him?”

 

Aeryn took the conversation back and Merrill wandered over to look at something near one of the wagons.  “Not Goran.  The true Prince, Sebastian Vael.” 

 

The dwarf rubbed the end of one of his braids in between two fingers, in a considering sort of habit.  “Oh, like that is it?  Heard rumors about him.  Thought he was dead, though.”  He shifted in his chair.  “Missy, have _you_ been to Starkhaven recently?”

 

“I’ve never been.”  Sometimes honesty would garner more honesty.

 

“You plannin’ on goin’ anytime soon?  ‘Cause I wouldn’t take your sweet bit, there.”

 

“My…you mean Merrill?”

 

“Yeah.  Elves…don’t do too well in Starkhaven.  They shut the Alienage there down, burned it to the ground, on account of vermin breeding.”

 

“What?  When was this?”

 

“’Bout six months ago.  Wasn’t no one in it by then,” he assured her.  “Elves have been…scarce up there, for a while.  Didn’t see a one while I was there a year ago.  It’s a strange place.  No elves.  Not many dwarves, not even as smiths.  No decent taverns.  Markets are kind of empty.”  Cordin leaned back in the camp chair, settling in for his story in a way that was comforting and familiar.  “That’s why I went, you know.  Heard that trade had gotten slow, thought it might be a good place to make some coin…but…”  He shook his head.  “No one’s got any to spare.  Even the nobles are tight fisted, when you can find one.  Most of ‘em have scattered out to their villas in the country.  That’s what I heard, anyway.  They ain’t much for talking to traders.”

 

That didn’t sound right.  It didn’t sound at all like the beautiful, prosperous city Sebastian had told her about.  She needed to get back and talk to him.  “Thank you, Messere.”

 

“No problem, missy.  You’re welcome to camp here.  Always use the extra eyes.”

 

“We’ll  see.”  Merrill had wandered to the edge of the camp to see if any of the silverbane she was wanting had sprouted on the edge of the clearing. 

 

Aeryn caught up to her. “Merrill?  Are you up to making the trek back tonight?  I’d like to talk to Sebastian as soon as I can.”

 

“About the elves in Starkhaven?  Hawke, it would take something terrible to make city elves shake themselves loose.  I mean, look at Kirkwall…everything that happened and still…”

 

“Yeah.   It’s definitely something to worry us.  And it’s possible that none of the nobles Sebastian has spoken with have mentioned it, but…if they’re covering, he needs to know.  So does Alistair.  They might be able to ferret some things out with the ambassadors.”

 

“That’s fine, Hawke.  Oh, we passed a moonvine at that cave.  It would be better to dig it when the moon’s up.”  Merrill mentioned it hopefully and despite her urgency, Aeryn smirked.  Alistair was going to be lucky if there was _room_ for roses in the garden, once the elf was through.

 

“Sure, Merrill.  I’ve got room in my pack for another vine, I think.”

 

Cordin, emerging from his tent, saw them gathering their things.  “Hey, you’re not going back out there?  Wolves and shit.  Haunted, too, they say, since Anora Mac Tir died up that way.”  He jerked his head to the east, past the path they would take.

 

Aeryn gave him a grin.  “Really?  Haunted?  Sounds like fun.”

 

“Humans.”  He shook his head as Merrill and Aeryn waved and took off in a lope.

 

Not long after the moon reached its apex, the two women reached the cave.  Perching on a rounded boulder, Aeryn took advantage of the pause to nibble at a sturdy piece of shortbread the palace cook had tucked into their packs while Merrill dug up her vine.  

 

She passed a clump to Aeryn to pack away carefully.   Wrapping the delicate roots in a swathe of thin doeskin, Aeryn decided to ask something she’d been considering a while.  Delicate matter, though. 

 

“Merrill…”

 

After letting the pause stretch a moment, while she patted the earth back into it’s place, Merrill pressed.  “Yes, Hawke?”

 

The rogue was giving her something of a shy, sheepish look.  “Oh, alright.  I’m going to ask, but feel free to smack me if I’m too forward or I’m being disrespectful.”

 

Merrill smiled with a bit of delight.  “Oh, that would be a story to tell, smacking the dire and dangerous Hawke!  Ask!”  She settled herself back on her heels, as if preparing to hear a tale, and Aeryn chuckled.

 

“With the Dalish…who is it that does your _vallaslin_?”  Merrill had always been impressed that Hawke managed the pronunciations as well as most of the city elves, at least. 

 

“The Keepers, to be sure.”  Merrill’s eyes were wide as she tried to figure out where Hawke was leading.

 

“Does that mean you know how to do the tattooing?  You were First.”

 

“I…yes.  I don’t know the rituals that go along…other than what was involved in my own.”  She knew Hawke had a tattoo, Isabela had mentioned it once or twice.  “Were there rituals when you had yours done?”

 

Aeryn shook her head, with a grin.  “No.  It was more a matter of coin and…umm…well, the fellow who did mine wanted another sort of payment.”  Merrill looked a little unsure, as she often did when her friends were too vague about sexual matters. 

 

“I was sleeping with him, so he offered, Merrill.” 

 

“Oooh.  Does that bother Sebastian?”  Maybe Hawke wanted to have it removed.  There _were_ spells for that…but they were variations on healing spells.  Bethany would be a better choice.

 

“Hmm?  Oh.  No.”  Hawke’s grin had gone a bit wicked.  “No, he doesn’t seem to be bothered by it.” 

 

“Why would you think I’d smack you for asking about that?”  Merrill asked, mystified.

 

“Well, I know that the Dalish are very…careful of their traditions.  But…mostly I was wondering if you could…Would it be offensive if I asked if you could maybe do me another?”

 

Merrill blinked.  “You want another…oh.”  She shook her head.  “Oh, Hawke, I don’t know.  I haven’t in a long time and…I don’t think it would look right.”  She brushed a slim finger along Hawke’s cheekbone.  “I think Sebastian would be terribly upset if you…”

 

“Oh, not on my face, Merrill.  Nothing elaborate, nor even very big.  Something small...tiny, really…and private.  I’d go to a regular tattooist, but to be honest, I haven’t found one that seems particularly trustworthy.” 

 

Turning her attention back to the dirt, Merrill fussed trying to get it to return to smooth covering, taking care to replace a few dislodged stones and straightening leaves.  “I…Let me think about it, please?” 

 

“There’s no hurry, Merrill.  Still sure you aren’t going to box my ears for impudence?”

 

“Well, not yet.  Maybe later.”  The little smile the elf gave her assured Aeryn that she hadn’t over-stepped too far.  She stood up and brushed the leaves from her backside.  Something caught her eye under the light of the wide, full moon and she padded over.  “Oh, look!  It’s a hazelnut bush.  I haven’t had these in…oh…an age at least.  We used to have a hedge of them, bordering a field.”

 

 Coming up to look, Merrill was already pulling out one of her collapsible leather baskets.  “Ooh.  Those’re lovely.  I know a bread that uses those, all toasted and ground up.”  The two set to gathering nuts, squirrelish in their industry.  

 

Well, she might not have Macie in tow.  But at least Aeryn could bring back a bit of treasure.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bit of a short chapter, but still setting up the next run.


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _**author's notes** Bear with me, dear readers, I promise we'll get back to longer chapters soonish. Until then, have a bit of an internal Sebastian mental ramble. Followed by an existential crisis. Some text taken from the Chant of Light._

Sebastian had watched them leave the gates and with a rueful glance at the steps that would take him up to a guardpost and allow him to observe as Aeryn disappeared in to the city, he turned back to the palace. 

He and Isabela would only be needed for a gathering later that evening. Dierdre had taken a few days of hiding and coddling after the incident at her nameday dinner, but had recently put her foot down. Only at the public occasions would she allow more than two extra guards, now that the servants had been questioned and the one conspirator put to death.

Sebastian couldn’t blame the queen. He’d have chafed, too true, under such constant observation. And Maker knew, if he ever tried something like that with Aeryn, she’d likely have his ears to wear around her neck. But then, she was…well, Aeryn Hawke. And, too, she would have him and maybe even Fenris with her in the years to come. She was simply less vulnerable than Ferelden’s expectant queen. He mused for a few moments, indulging himself in a bit of a daydream, as he made his way back to their quarters.

So he found himself at loose ends, now that Aeryn was off and without Macie to guide. How long had it been, Sebastian wondered, since he’d had anything like free time? Alone, with no one to follow or to lend aid to? His Chantry days had never seen anything like idleness, for such was never allowed. Even the feeblest, eldest mothers were given duties fit for their hands. And once he’d started chasing about with Aeryn, Sebastian had often found himself nearly meeting himself going, trying to keep up with his duties, his interests among the nobles, and Aeryn’s doings. 

What to do, then? With a bit of thought, Sebastian decided to go and walk the city. It was safe enough, in broad daylight…well, cloudy, damp, chilly daylight…for another three hours or so. Ferelden wasn’t showing her best colors, though apparently it wasn’t unusual for this time of year. He could have a stroll, look into a few shops…and there was an idea. He had a bit of coin left from his Wicked Grace winnings at Vigil’s Keep. A bit more from a quiet hand of Diamond back he, Isabela and Fenris shared with Alistair's guardsmen. And he needed to come up with a something for Aeryn’s Satinalia gift. 

They’d never exchanged gifts for feast days. She’d nixed the whole idea after she’d met her fortune in the Deep Roads, not wanting any of her companions…mainly Merrill, Anders and himself…to feel as though they had to compete. They all had the habit of doing small services for one another in lieu of presents. And though Aeryn had always been generous, with coin, small trinkets she found on her wandering, and the treats from her and Orana’s hands that they’d enjoyed giving out, none of those things had been official gifts. His grandmother’s locket, passed to his eldest brother’s daughter, had been one such thing. 

He’d not even known when her nameday was until last year, and that well after the fact. According to Fenris, Aeryn never allowed them to do more than spot her a drink. Have to try and remedy that, come Guardian. She’d turn 29, Sebastian thought. It ought to be special. And she had liked those violets so well.

Denerim had put away the finery it had donned for Dierdre’s nameday. Still, the market district bustled and he found a nice flat edged fountain to observe the folk going about their business for a time. There was a chance he might catch a glimpse of Macie…or just one of the street children who could lead him to her. Aeryn seemed to think the foolish girl was still in the city.

Starkhaven’s market had been like this, when he was a boy, though more exotic and with a broader section of Northern Thedas’ population. Orlais, Antiva and Rivain were all common to be seen there, on the Minanter. Tevinters, too, come to trade for the abundant grain and herbage Starkhaven provided, looking superior and cruel. Slaves were not allowed in Starkhaven. On the gates had been signs warning that any one suspected of bringing in slaves would have them confiscated without repayment, in the name of the Chantry. But it happened now and again, that you would see a small, shadowy figure scuttling in the wake of a richly dressed patron and you’d know.

None of that here. Oh, there were elves who were clearly denizens of the alienage. And other lowborn, too. Plenty of servants. But they were all clearly employed at some task or another or gathered to visit with friends. And none gave off that aura of cowed fear that had haunted the slaves he’d seen. Sebastian grinned. In fact, it might be he was the only fellow in the whole marketplace who didn’t have someplace to be. 

The various shops and stalls drew his eye. Next to the fabric stall, there was a tiny stand done up as neatly and ornately as a jewel box, a swathe of midnight blue silk covering the plain wooden surfaces. Appropriately, since there were jewels and decorative pieces on display. Sebastian didn’t think he could afford anything flamboyant, nor would Aeryn wear such a thing…but maybe he might get an idea. 

“Welcome, ser, to my shop. Are you looking for anything in particular?”

“No…just having a bit of a wander.” He smiled at the plump woman, her own fingers encircled with silver and gold and earrings dangling. “I thought to find something for my lady.” 

“Oh, lucky girl. You and a jewel.” The older lady gave him what had once been a nicely coquettish smile. “You’ll have luck here. My husband makes beautiful things. And he knows the hearts of women.”

There were rings…but Sebastian had no intention of going down that path until he could place the one he already had on Aeryn’s finger. She’d never wear any necklace that wasn’t laced with runes. Even the jet piece she wore for formal dress was etched with protective enchantments. Her ears weren’t pierced. Nor did she have any use for the delicate tracery of a circlet…though, he had a sudden image of Aeryn, head upheld in that way of hers, in the piece his mother and grandmothers had once worn as Lady of Starkhaven. 

And what had happened to that ancient bit of filigree? His mother, that beautiful, icy woman, had loved it and the royal picture she made wearing it; tall and raven-haired with dark blue eyes, mirrored by the sapphire in the circlet. Sebastian shook himself back to the present, wincing away from any comparison between his sharp, sweet Aeryn and Alessandra Vael. Even at her coldest, Aeryn was a world apart from the woman who had left him to nannies and staff to raise. Leave that to the Maker, long in the past. 

Sebastian was about to take his leave when a small open leather case pushed to the side caught him up. There were small bits of iridescent shell, fashioned into flowers and cleverly attached to hair pins laid out on the velvet. Aeryn was using such pins, now, with her hair longer. Hers were all plain bronze and sturdy, though. She’d grinned the first time she’d used them to hold the unruly waves behind her ears back. “An extra set of lockpicks, at least.”

These would never stand to such a use, fragile things. Aeryn was so fond of practical items…but, he wanted a treat for her. Exotic chrysanthemums, innocent apple blossoms. And there, pale purple with a bit of inlay, was a pair that looked like a spray of violets, with red-gold pins that would show nicely with her dark auburn hair. He was almost afraid to ask the cost. ‘Excuse me…might I ask the price of these?” Sebastian drew the attention of the merchant who had been attending another customer. 

She eyed him, shrewdly. “Hmm. Six silver for the pair.” She held her hand out for Sebastian’s coin and then, as she packaged up the delicate accessories in a bit of protective flannel, the older woman smiled. “She must be an especially picky little thing. You looked at every piece I had.”

“Special’s the word, yes. Thank you.”

Package safely tucked in one of his pouches…though he’d have to hide it before Aeryn returned, to prevent an accidental reveal from her light fingers and curious nature… Sebastian stopped in the tavern for a bit of luncheon. Even Varric had admitted that the Gnawed Noble had a better menu than the Hanged Man had ever boasted. Or at least, it tasted better, the crust of the pastry on his rabbit pie almost flaky enough to rival Orana’s. Well, it was claimed to be rabbit. Could be nug for all he knew, but Sebastian has ceased to be overly picky about such things. 

The other patrons came and went as he watched. Busy people with lives to lead that might seem insignificant to most. Who cared what inner thoughts the carter had or whether or not that merchant was considering expanding from a small stall to a larger stand and perhaps a shop. But it was the duty of a city's leader to care. Even before, before the refugees had overwhelmed Kirkwall, Dumar had been a puppet and Kirkwall had suffered for it. Denerim and Amaranthine were flourishing. Alistair was a good king, taking pains to rebuild better than what had been before. 

Starkhaven had run itself in good times. Not fool enough to believe there are nothing but good times ahead, though, Sebastian thought. The mage issue would not contain itself in Kirkwall. He couldn't fault Aeryn for choosing to rescue as many of the mages as she could...though in the end it hadn't been many. At the very least, the Divine would be sending Seekers to the other Circles. And Starkhaven's Circle was long since destroyed. It occurred to him that he had no idea what had happened to the mages born in the city and its surrounds since. Another thing he would have to ask. But...Maker, now that he thought, it was strange that not one of his contacts had mentioned such a problem. Many had died in the fire. Some had come to Kirkwall...but the next nearest Circle was in Orlais. Perhaps Bethany would have some idea. Or he could ask Alistair to send to Kinloch Hold for what information they had. 

There were other people in Starkhaven besides mages, though. And from what Alistair said, the way trade had fallen off, it didn't bode well. Starkhaven was the breadbasket of Thedas. There had been a drought a few years ago. The letters Sebastian had received before he left Kirkwall mentioned that the principality's finances were shaky. There were bandits were plaguing the roads between the outlying villages. None of it augured well for the state of the city. On such information had he made his decision to return to Starkhaven. 

Seeing Denerim thrive, watching how Alistair worked to make it so, was beginning to chafe at Sebastian. He needed to be doing _something_ towards regaining Starkhaven. 

It was past time to start. Varric would be the one to begin with, who would know best if his idea had any merit. Since Sebastian had learned of the bandits, he’d been considering a more subtle path to re-establishing himself as a rightful prince, to bringing his name back to Starkhaven’s attention. After all, he was a part of the finest band of bandit hunters he’d ever come across. And who would object to a man returning to aid his birthplace? There need be no mention of the throne. At first. 

When Sebastian stepped back out into the grey day, the Chantry Bells were ringing afternoon services. He’d been going to the palace chapel since they’d come to Denerim. Alistair had assured him of Mother Beatrice’s ability to keep a confidence and Sebastian had found her sermons to be well-thought out and moderate in their theology. He had yet to go to confession again, though. He was having a difficult time trusting anyone with some of the things he would have to reveal. His lingering anger at Anders for his betrayal, the worries he bore about having to start a war. He and Aeryn discussed such things and he’d felt better for it…but he admitted to craving the absolution that a long habit of confession made comforting. 

And too, there were the things that Sebastian could not discuss with his love, without making them a burden. His fears for her. His worry that he would never be enough to make her happy nor capable of helping her reconcile her heart with the Maker. Those things could be set before a Mother, though, to hand to the divine. 

Enough. There was time for that. Today, though, Sebastian decided to go to Chant. The palace services were nice enough, but there was something to be said for kneeling amongst a larger company, with voices in unison.

The Denerim Chantry was open and airy, with the high beamed construction and half timber framing that was most common in Ferelden. The crowd that Sebastian found himself in was smaller than he’d expected, considering the size of the sanctuary. A few older nobles and well-to-do merchants and then a smattering of common folk, most clearly on their way home from their work. They all filed to their accustomed places and one by one joined in the Chant, led by a sister standing near the base of the Andraste figure. Inwardly frowning at the feeble turnout, Sebastian found a place near the middle and knelt, allowing himself to be drawn into the familiar and soothing rhythm.

The Chant ended as the cantor withdrew and Sebastian was surprised to see that a few of the worshippers quietly exited before the…ah. The Grand Cleric chose to give the message, today. 

Grand Cleric Geneva was a tall, spare woman, though age was telling on her, fighting to pull her down from the stiff backed form she maintained. The lined face with its strong features lacked Elthina’s sense of serenity. Geneva looked like a woman accustomed to war, which, Sebastian supposed, was just as well, considering Ferelden’s not too distant past.

In a ringing voice, she proclaimed the verse. “Magic is meant to serve man…” 

Sebastian raised his eyebrow at the young man next to him who was whispering under his breath, “Sodding Void, not _again_.” The fellow remained on his knees, but he took out a pamphlet about farming techniques and started reading, one finger tracing the grout line of the stone under him, clearly uninterested in the subject of the sermon.

“Oh, children. There is such a dismal, dreadful space between those words and the way Ferelden lives now.” Geneva made a path through the history of the Circles, not veering too far from historical fact but the way she spoke, the chiding tone of her voice, set Sebastian’s teeth on edge. 

Ah, well. It was not the first time he’d sat through a less than inspiring sermon. While Elthina had almost always had something pithy and relevant to speak on, the other mothers and visiting Revered Mothers were not as consistently interesting. Sebastian had nearly distracted himself with contemplation of the statue of the Beloved, a gentler version than had adorned the Kirkwall Chantry, when he heard Grand Cleric Geneva finally circle around to a vicious point.

“And now, my children, we live in a decadent and lost age. For our king, the man who should be holiest and most reverent in gratefulness to the Maker for the coincidences that brought him to the throne…our king, instead of leading this poor country, holy Andraste’s birthplace, has chosen wickedness. Has chosen rebellion. Has chosen pride. For he has chosen to allow magic to run rampant. He disbands the Circle, claiming that apostates aided Ferelden during and after the Blight. He allows elves to worship freely their pagan spirits, taking land from honest people, because he claims the Hero asked it of him.” Sebastian had abandoned his contemplation in shock, instead focusing on the woman before him. A quiet, but building, angry buzz was filling the sacred space. A bitter sense of familiarity crept over him. 

Petrice’s sermons had once spread such anger, such resentment. And where had that led? 

Geneva didn’t seem to hear it. She continued, “We can only hope, children, that this is merely pride and arrogance on the part of the King. That there is no influence upon him, by one of the apostates he has allowed to run free without the temperance of the Maker’s servant Templars. Will he be brought to heel by the will of the faithful? Or will we be forced to watch again, the destruction of the Chantry at the hand of a mage with no fetter? We cannot. We must act…”

 _Holy Beloved…how dare she_? Sebastian found himself on his feet and he could only imagine the look on his face, for Geneva was startled out of her speech enough to address him. “Child…”

Perhaps she expected him to be cowed into kneeling again, but Sebastian was not a simple farmer, numbed enough to accept blasphemy in order to rest. “No, I am not your child. And this is not the message of the loving Andraste. Suspicion and vile gossip? Empty accusation? Incitement to rebellion? These are the things that lead to violence and destruction. You lead your flock astray, Your Grace.” 

Spinning on his heel, Sebastian left the sanctuary, left the Chantry, a sense of loss and despair coiling in his gut. Others followed, including the farmer’s lad. Sebastian bit back an urge to rebuke them. He was _not_ turning his back on the Maker, nor Andraste. It was not his beliefs in question here, but the way the Cleric was twisting the holy words of the Chant. 

Behind him, Sebastian could hear the echoing words of the cantor, still singing in the alcove her contribution to the never-ending Chant of Light, begging attention from their withdrawn Maker…”the righteous stand before the darkness and the Maker shall guide their hand…” 

_Oh, Maker, guide me. Please let that have been the right choice._


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _As always, thanks to mille libri for her beta extrordinaire. All mistakes are mine. Bioware owns all, I'm just happy to play in the sandbox._

Bethany had been quiet as she, Varric, and Fenris trekked down the West Road. She’d laughed at their shared jokes and marveled again at the changes in Fenris since she’d last travelled with the warrior.

There’d been a time when she’d only been able to take Aeryn’s word that the elf had a sense of humor. Whenever they’d fought together, before Bethany had gone to the Circle, he had been silent and disapproving. He had never, if she recalled, spoken directly to her at all, except for once when she had healed him. A begrudging thanks and a barely controlled shudder when she’d set her hands on him and then he’d jerked away with distaste and perhaps a brush of fear. But that had changed, clearly.

Fenris had been all courtesy on their journey. Even aboard ship, he'd been willing to converse with her in his gruff manner and once, when an errant wave had lurched the ship and she’d fallen against him, fingers brushing the lyrium exposed by his armor…and solid and unmoving he’d been, despite his lithe frame…he’d merely caught her and set her back on her feet, with a “Careful.” This morning he'd even gone so far as to make a little quip about robes not being the most practical clothing for traversing the wilderness. 

He was right too, Bethany thought ruefully as she minced along the rocks that created a footpath, however slippery, across a small creek. She'd caught branches in the folds when they brushed through the narrower parts of the shortcut path. Her hem, perfectly fine for traveling city streets, was going to need mending when she returned to the palace after snagging it on greenbriar and wild rose. She might have to consider a change back to something more like the tabard and leggings she'd once adopted if she was going to be following her sister all over Thedas.

At least the robes were warm, though. They'd had good enough weather on the outward journey, but after meeting with the caravan and discovering the trek had indeed been fruitless, they'd chosen to camp nearby for the night as the temperature plunged and the wind picked up. Rain had started to fall, in intermittent, ever more frequent, showers.

The morning had come too early, with icy water seeping into Bethany's tent. Aeryn loved this sort of thing, always had, but Bethany had a sudden longing for the cell she'd called home for six years. Dry and warmed by a brazier shaped like a curled up cat, burning coals making the green glass eyes flicker. A Satinalia gift from mother, her second year away. Before she had left, Cullen had brought her a box of sandalwood incense cones, to set in the special nook built into the brazier for such things. 

She dressed and outside she'd heard a familiar curse as Fenris stepped in an icy puddle and Bethany had to refrain from a giggle. Aeryn had warned him. 

"We passed two good cobblers on the way out of town, Fenris." Varric reminded him. 

"Mention boots again and I will show you were you can put yours, Dwarf." came the answer but not in the snarl it would have once upon a time. "Why Hawke insisted on introducing us to her homeland during the dregs of winter, I will never understand. Antiva was just as far from Kirkwall's mess. And warm."

"Sad to say, Broody, I think this is still autumn."

"Always the comfort, Varric." She heard her cue as Fenris stirred the campfire. "And the fire has gone out."

"I can at least heat the kettle, Fenris," Bethany offered with only a tiny hesitation as she emerged from her tent.

He glanced up at her and gave a slight nod. She flicked her fingers and the swinging tea kettle glowed with a warmth spell. A few minutes later, they all had a sturdy mug of tea and a hot bowl of oatmeal, baked over night in the coals and just as easily reheated as the water.

"Sunshine, you're a treasure. Don't ever let anyone tell you different." Bethany grinned at Varric's declamation and if she hadn't noticed how Fenris agreed with a quiet smile as she tucked into her breakfast, Varric had. 

And now, Fenris was not quite hovering as she crossed rime-slicked stones across the small creek. Despite her best efforts, she did slide a bit and was glad enough to feel his strong hand under her arm. "Thank you." And maybe it was the startled surprise in Bethany's voice that made him smile again. On no one else would that slight tilt of lips be a smile.

"Of course," came the rumbled reply. “Hawke wouldn’t want you returned bruised.”

Oh, well. That was it then. Aeryn had asked him to look after her.

Past the creek and finally back on the raised Tevinter roadway, Varric asked Bethany to tell a few of the things she recalled of Ferelden. She somehow wound up telling of the time Aeryn had used her little throwing knives to pin Carver's tunic tail to a wall while he was talking to a girl, after he'd pinned Bethany's braid to the bedpost once too often. Their brother had fallen over his feet, knocking Peaches over in his flailing, and then chased Aeryn over half of Lothering, with their light-footed, limber sister dodging and weaving and Carver scattering shoppers and carts just as the Bann had come through on his biannual processional. Just as repercussions were about to fall onto Carver's head, Aeryn had managed to turn the whole mess into a staged entertainment and the Bann had even given Carver a congratulations on his very convincing performance as a buffoon. 

"I can't believe Aeryn never told you that story. It was one of those tales that we told over and..." she caught the tiniest of glimpses between the two companions and stopped. "What?" 

"Well, you know, Hawke likes to tell a story or two. But she doesn't talk much about your brother or Lothering, Sunshine."

"Oh. I see." She didn't really. And in truth, she was getting rather tired of it. Aeryn had nightmares, but no one spoke of them and Bethany had a hard time believing that as bad as the time with Meeran had been, Aeryn was still suffering ill dreams from it. Bethany had wonderful memories of Lothering, and while none of them had wanted to dwell on the past those first hard years, surely now it was alright for the two of them to reminisce. But Aeryn inevitably found something else to do when Bethany wanted to talk about Mother or Father or Carver. Aeryn evaded and ducked in a conversation the way she did on a battlefield and it was time for it to end. 

Fenris noticed a rather familiar obstinate set to Bethany's chin. They were very similar, the two sisters, once you got past the difference in coloring. There was an inner well of calm in the younger sister that Hawke lacked, however. Hawke, for all her innate stillness and quiet, seemed always poised on the edge of mischief or chaos, hard to grasp as one of her shadows. The mage...no, he thought, it did not seem right to think of her with the same spat out word he thought of Anders with- just Bethany then… perhaps due to the control she exerted over her magic, was always very solid. It was restful. Shaking himself out of introspection, Fenris noticed Varric giving him a contemplative consideration.

Bethany walked ahead of them, with a demure sway, along the ancient stone highway. Varric hurried to catch up, but not before he shot the elf a sly look. "I gotta say, Broody. You're probably the only one Hawke would ever let get within a bloody stump's reach of her baby sister. But make sure Rivaini knows the score."

Varric chuckled at the bewilderment that crossed Fenris' sharp features and patted Bianca as he started to tell Bethany about the time her sister had gone to the Fade for that Feynriel kid.

 

\----0000--- 

Sebastian went straight to Alistair after his confrontation in the Chantry. In the privacy of his study, the king listened earnestly enough to Sebastian's confession and then gave him a bit of a rueful grin. "Yes, well, it's nothing new. Grand Cleric Geneva's had it in for me since Duncan yanked me out of the Templars from under her nose. I appreciate the support, though." 

Sprawled gracelessly in an armchair, his disquiet showing in the way his foot bounced, Sebastian asked, "You knew about her...rabble-rousing?" 

"Yes. I take it you noticed that she doesn't get much of a crowd? They've taken to not even announcing when she speaks. The last couple of times, the Chantry was almost empty." He shrugged. "After that ‘unauthorized history of the Blight’ came out...which took to extremes some of my punishments during my time at the Chantry and the way Geneva spoke of Lyna…” Alistair shrugged. “People sort of stopped taking the Cleric particularly seriously. I did _encourage_ certain attendants to keep me informed about her activities and her contacts. But I'm trying very hard not to be guilty of, ah, influencing matters too much." Alistair handed the prince a cup of mulled wine, just steaming from the kettle that the attendant had just brought in. The archer stared into it, as if he hoped the powdered spices swirling on the top would resolve into some sort of answer.

Used to such need for self-examination, Alistair returned to his own leather chair and glanced through a letter of state until the other man regained his attention.

Finally, Sebastian shook his head. "You'll have to forgive me, Alistair. I'm still...I spent my years in Kirkwall serving a woman who took her duties as the head of the Chantry in the Free Marches very seriously and did her best to balance the two sides of controversial issues as best she could. It was something of a shock to hear Geneva so... _openly_ speaking out." Worriedly he added, "We had some experience with that in Kirkwall. It turned out...rather poorly." 

"The Qunari?" At Sebastian's nod, Alistair hesitated before he spoke again. "I had taken the impression that many felt that Grand Cleric Elthina's middle ground approach was less than inspiring." 

Sighing, Sebastian reluctantly agreed as he set his cup aside. "It was also less than successful, in the end, but I can’t say anything else would have turned out better. I was once guilty of encouraging her to take up the Templars' side a bit more proactively." 

That clearly surprised Alistair. "The Templars? Really?" 

Sebastian couldn't help a bit of an embarrassed shrug. "Well, I didn't always know mages so well. And, to be quite honest, with the exception of Bethany, none of the ones I did know exactly inspired confidence in their ability to choose wisely for themselves." 

"And what side was Hawke on?"

"Well...Aeryn has a...difficult relationship wi' the Chantry."

"Apostate sister and father, blood mage and an abomination for companions? Yes, I can imagine." Alistair's dry tone sparked a smirk on his friend's face.

"Still, except for right after Bethany went to the Circle, I don't believe Aeryn ever spoke out in any way but to support reasonable discourse and sensible restraint on both sides. Though..." Sebastian hesitated, but Aeryn had told him Alistair was to know the truth of things. "She also never hesitated to strike down a Templar that she thought threatened Bethany or Merrill or Anders. She was, occasionally, less than careful in former days." He dragged a hand through his hair, recalling. "But once we came to be friends and she got to know the Grand Cleric better, Aeryn supported Elthina, if not the Chantry."

Curious, Alistair couldn't help but ask. "Was that never a problem for you?"

"Oh, aye. It still pops up...but we...work with it. It's not that she doesn't have faith, you know, but..." Sebastian stopped. No. That was a bit too personal. One thing to talk about such things with Fenris or Varric...or even Bethany, should she ever ask. "Well, we work with it. Did Lyna believe or..."

"Well, you know, she was very Dalish. And she spoke quite openly of her disdain for the Chantry. It...heh. Well, she threatened a mother once over a disagreement. We had a few words over that. I can’t say she ever came to respect it. Dierdre's faithful. It's for her, mostly, that I have Mother Beatrice here in the palace, though I admit that I find it... comforting to talk to her."

"I'm glad to hear it, then. Speaking of which...confession is in an hour. I need to go...pray. Maybe explain myself a bit, I think."

Alistair gave his chin a rub, before he asked, "I take it this was your first act of heresy?"

Sebastian snorted. "I knew you were distracted when I explained the whole bit about my revoking my vows to the Maker's Bride and moving in w'out an official blessing with my lover."

"Isabela with a deck in her hand is a distraction...but that wasn't heresy, man. That was you figuring out what you were meant to be. Take it from me, the first time is the hardest. Maker knows, I have attracted enough attention from those quarters that if it wasn't for the fact that things are starting to fall apart everywhere else, I'm fairly sure I'd have Seekers in every corner of my kingdom. And possibly my sock drawer.” More soberly he added, “You know that there are rumors that the Divine is considering an Exalted March on Orzammar...what with Bhelen's free Circle and the lyrium trade shifting."

"We...had heard some whispers, before. But I was out of the loop on such things, the last few months."

"My contact tells me it's almost a sure thing, especially now after Kirkwall. And...since they'll be marching right through Ferelden..." Alistair heaved a sigh and took a gulp from his own cup. The wine had cooled while they talked, but the warmth of the spices managed to filter through, soothingly. "I don't suppose you'd rather just stay here and have yourself a division of archers? It may be I'll need the help." 

"Will it come to that?" Sebastian didn't know why he was shocked. All the signs were pointing to a chaotic future. All the more reason to take back Starkhaven and secure the place as a stronghold. Against whatever the days to come might bring. 

"Well, we'll see, won't we?" Alistair cleared his throat and looked out over the garden under his window. There were heavy clouds gathering, promising rain. "You should go, lest you miss your chance to try and shock Mother Beatrice. She's well used to me, though, so it may take some doing." A twinkle in his eye told his jest. Alistair, for all his merry ways, was not a licentious king. 

Sebastian noticed a sprinkling of silver just at the king's temples, and a strand or two in the neatly trimmed beard he was recently sporting as he took his leave. Hardly noticeable in the warmly lit study, unless you had an archer's eyes. It made Alistair look distinguished rather than older but somehow there was a chill to it. Anders had said once that Wardens lead shorter lives than other men. 

The last few years had been hard ones, rebuilding Ferelden, and Sebastian wondered if he'd bear so well under the weight. Then again, he'd not be heartsick on top of it all. He'd have Aeryn to stand with him. It was a bolstering thought, but even so he yet had plenty to consider as he made his way to the chapel.

\---000--- 

Sebastian, despite his promise to Aeryn, spent much of the night in contemplation on his knees, though not for loneliness. Revered Mother Beatrice was indeed a sympathetic confessor, but she had impressed upon him the need to examine his actions for pride. It was sensible enough advice, considering his former failings. Still he'd taken enough sleep to be fresh for the meeting with the ambassador and not yawn his way through it. He'd stopped the chambermaid from changing their linens and the pillows still smelled of Aeryn, the almond cream and that whiff of leather and steel and warm sweetness that was simply her.

He thought he acquitted himself quite well with the Ambassador of Cumberland, steering Alistair away from one or two touchy territorial issues that only a Marcher would consider important. He'd also managed to encourage the development of a trade in the salted fish he recalled that Alistair had mentioned a surplus of. The Cumberland folk were fond of fish and the majority of their fleet had been wrecked in a violent storm last Guardian. The ambassador, who had virtually ignored him at first, had -in the end- bowed slightly when the meeting finally broke off just before luncheon. 

Harry, their page, met him at the door of the meeting chamber with an impudent sparkle in his green eyes. "Your Highness, M'lady Hawke and Mistress Merrill returned an hour ago. She waits upon you in your quarters."

Sebastian couldn't help his grin. "Thanks, lad." 

Aeryn was asleep, though, after her trek. Dark red hair still damp from her bath and waving across her smooth forehead as she curled in a ball on her side, snugged under the woolen blanket and...ah, wearing his tunic again; Sebastian chuckled at the sight. Sweet mouth slightly parted and her lashes in fans on her cheeks, showing a bit of color after her hike in a brisk, blustery night. His lovely lass. He reached out to stroke her hair back, but pulled up. She slept lightly enough, and he'd disturb her. 

There was a small basket of nuts and leaves on the table, next to a note in her neat, slanting hand. "No sign of Macie. Wake me when you get in, news of Starkhaven." 

Really? Ah, well. Surely not so urgent he couldn't let her rest. It had taken nearly the whole of their voyage to chase Kirkwall's bruising shadows from under her eyes and Sebastian had no intention of allowing their return. 

Debating leaving her to her nap, Sebastian decided instead to read in their room. Alistair had handed him a sheaf of reports on Orzammar and Sebastian wanted to plow through them. Turning the armchair a bit, he could catch light on the paper without lighting candles, and also keep watch on her sleep. 

He nudged the kettle closer to the fire. They'd taken to keeping tea and snacks in their rooms, since it wasn't quite so easy to traipse through the castle for a kitchen raid as it had been at her estate. It was a cozy sort of feeling, the fire snapping in the grate and Aeryn's whuffling breath as she slept, the rain outside falling harder and a slight howl of wind wrapping itself around the eaves of the palace roof. 

Another hour or so later and Sebastian had just set the papers aside to rub his eyes and refresh his cup. The room had turned colder and he stood to pull up another blanket over Aeryn's sleeping form. A rattle at the window, as the rain turned to sleet. When he looked back, Aeryn was blinking at him like a sleepy kitten. "Ah, I did not mean to wake you," he apologized in a whisper. 

She reached a hand out to him. "You _should_ have woken me. Has the weather turned? It was starting to foul when we got in." At her tug, he sat down on the bed beside her and finally allowed himself to push the hair out of her eyes and give her a light kiss. 

"Aye, it's gotten cold enough to sleet and like as not there's snow behind it. There wasn't a need to wake you, though. No Macie, then?" 

"She might still be with the Redcliffe caravan," Aeryn reminded him, but he shrugged. 

"If she's decided that she doesn't want to be with us, there's not much we can do. You were right about that." He was not taking a chance that Aeryn might feel he blamed her, again. 

Setting her hands at the small of her back, Aeryn stretched the lithe length of her spine. The linen tunic was worn and thin in the flickering light and he could not for the life of him refrain from letting his gaze linger. "Any word from the others?"

"No, I've not heard them come in." Aeryn frowned and moved as if she might try and leave the bed to set out and search for them. "They likely camped last night, Aeryn. Give them a bit more time before you rally the city and commandeer Alistair's army." It was a gentle sort of tease, though, in his rich voice and Aeryn had to smile at him. He cupped her nape in one hand and rubbed slowly, watching her roll her head, so that he could work his fingers against the kinks in her long neck.

Humming her approval, she shifted and curled her sleep-warmed self into his arms. Sebastian resisted the urge to bear Aeryn down into the feather pillows and bury his cares in her sweet body, merely kissing her again when she tilted her face up.

His lips were warm and firm and he tasted of tea and his breath carried a hint of cinnamon, but Aeryn frowned inwardly, noticed a certain austerity to Sebastian's strong features when she pulled back a little, as if he was trying hard not to think about something or to still his face to not reveal some worry. What was going on, here? "What did I miss?"

"Hmm?" Too large, the tunic had slipped off her shoulder and the creamy curve of her breast was bared nearly down to the nipple. He dropped another kiss to her shoulder and she shivered as the rasp of his light stubble caught delicate skin.

Flames, she shouldn’t let him distract her, so. "Sebastian? Did the dinner go smoothly? No interruptions? Or was there a problem with the ambassador?"

"No, they went well. A bit dull, without you." He stroked one callused finger along her collarbone and flashed her a look from under his lashes. "I missed you, a ruin."

Was that all it was? Aeryn gave him a crooked smile and ran her hand down his waistcoat to flick open the silver buttons. "Well, I missed you too, my love." 

He sighed and buried his nose into the space between her jaw and neck, setting his lips right over the pulse point and was pleased to feel it leap against his tongue as he traced the pale blue line of her vein, under soft, scented skin. Loosening the corded laces, Sebastian slid his hand in and cupped her full breast, gently kneading, listening to her breath catch. 

"Did you? Did you think of me at all, while you were wondering out in your wild woods on an adventure?" 

"Of...of course I did, oh." He'd followed the vein down to her breast, rolling a taut little nipple between his teeth, flicking the caught nub with just the tip of his tongue. "Sebastian...ah, I always want you with me." Setting aside the tremble of anticipation snaking across her skin, Aeryn caught his face between her hands and made him look at her. "What is going on with you?" 

Sebastian didn't want to think about it. Not for a time. What might be happening out in the world, in Orzammar, in Starkhaven. Brewing in Val Royeaux behind the doors of the Grand Cathedral. Waiting for them in the coming days. Instead he wanted to lose himself in her. "Aeryn, _mo chridhe_ , I need you so." 

Aeryn was about to make a quip, but...oh...there was something vulnerable and hurting in his brilliant blue eyes, pinning her as effectively as one of his arrows and the longing in his husky plea sent her blood rushing and hot. Giving in to it (for now, she decided) Aeryn slid her fingers down his wide shoulders, calluses catching on the wellspun wool, and pulled him to her, instead, with gentle hands. "Come to me, then, my own."

He stripped the tunic from her, then, pulling the fine linen up and over, baring her to his burning gaze. Sliding back off the bed, to kneel at her feet, Sebastian wrapped his hands around her ankles, letting his own long, rough fingers close on the fine bones. "Open your legs, Aeryn." 

"Now why would I do that?" She’d play a bit, first. 

Lifting her foot, Sebastian traced the edge of one high arch and pressed his lips to her ankle, never taking his eyes from hers, nearly black, just a pale ring of smoked silver around blown pupils. "Because you love it when I kiss you, spread you for a feast." He licked up the toned muscle of her calf as she sighed.

"It's true." Hot open mouthed kisses trailing to the inside of her knees and her thighs fell open at the pressure, his breath on her skin, her body attuned to the pleasure his brogue was promising. "You do seem to like it yourself, though."

"Oh, aye. I need the taste of you. I _crave_ it, this pretty, wet cunny of yours, leannan." Sebastian palmed her plump mound, dark coppery brown curls tickling his palm, pressing as she pushed back against him with that hungry moan that curled his toes and tightened his focus to one goal. "All that long meeting I was thinking about how I'm going to lick and slide my tongue right up that hot, tight channel of yours and work you until you coat my mouth with your honey. Sharp and sweet, just like you, _à ruin_." Oh, yes and perhaps he should be ashamed, but she laughed, low and warm and all for him. 

"Oh, alright." Her casual answer at odds with the tense angle of her body as she strove to press herself closer to his mouth, falling back onto her elbows to free his path. "I'm game." His other hand wrapped her hip, holding her still.

"Not just yet," he breathed against her sensitive flesh. His thumb found her clit, but the feather-light touches only enticed, ratcheting her up towards pleasure, but not promising to send her over.

"Why?" Breathless, now as he set those calluses to work on the insides of her sleek, firm thighs as she thrust her hips towards him, entreating. Little teasing spirals of contact that never quite hit the mark, lingering fondly on the little blade inked there. She did have to wonder if he'd like another as well. Not the same. Something just for him. 

Sebastian paused, rested his head in her lap a moment and Aeryn's slim fingers mussed and tangled in his lightly curling hair stroking as he nuzzled against her belly. "Because I want you screaming my name, Aeryn." 

She had to laugh, again. And when, exactly, had she ever managed anything like restraint, when it came to that?

"I will, I always...Maker, don't I always..." But he looked up at her, almost sharply. Sebastian's eyes blazed in the flickering light shed by the fire and Aeryn bit her lip. Her archer had a target set. It never failed, that intensity of his, to make her want to surrender. 

"I dinna want to hear anything else, but you and these sweet sounds of you coming for me." He set his mouth to her then, finding her slick, warm center with an eager tongue, groaning lightly at flavor of her desire, thick on his tongue. Sweet Andraste, the way she melted for him. He parted her furrow with a careful hand, to bare her, all the easier to lave the little nub, savor it. 

"Oh...oh, my love,” she was panting as her head tossed against the bed. Easy enough to give herself over. She trusted him, the way she’d never trusted another, to devote himself to her pleasure. And the first threads of spiraling need, the throb of heat as he delicately traced her clit, made her moan. 

Lovely sound, but it wasn't enough. He wanted more of her. Under his hands, that lovely steel that flexed beneath her creamy skin turned malleable as he worked.

"Tell me what you want, _à ruin_." Sebastian put a snap into the words that shivered along her spine and she murmured something unintelligible. "No. I want to _hear_ it."

Ah, but she wasn't all sweetness and give, his _rùn biodagain_. No blushing girl, his love. Her strong fingers gripped in his hair and she pulled his head back, sharply. Intensity in the curve of her lip, almost a snarl. "I want your mouth on me, Sebastian. I want that wicked smooth tongue of yours and your fingers in my sheath and when I've finished screaming your name to your satisfaction, oh prince, I want your pretty thick cock buried to the hilt so that I can feel you all the way to my heart. And then we'll see who begs and trembles, shall we?" His cock, already swollen and hard against his laces, twitched suddenly as if called to attention by her order. 

"I can manage that I think." He tugged his head away, but she didn't let go easily and he felt the twinge, a spark of pain to sweeten the pot a wee bit. He couldn’t help his moan as he thought, _two can play that lover's game_. Sebastian smacked her pert arse as he delved back into her folds, her jerk driving his nose against her clit.

The jolt of sensation made her gasp and press harder against him and she felt the lightest scrape of teeth when his mouth closed on her sensitive bud. Aeryn let her hands, freed from his hair, drift up her own body to cup her breasts and Sebastian slid his fingers into her, spread slightly to let the rough, hardened skin scrape the inner walls enticingly. He teased and twirled his nimble tongue and his fingers slid slowly and it only took a bit of such attention to have Aeryn arching into him like his bow. "Sebastian...oh, please..."

"More? Of course, _mo chride_ , anything you want." Another finger to spread her wider and then the flat of his tongue against her nub. Again. His fingers crooked and he lifted his head again as she gasped. “Pinch those perfect little nipples, Aeryn. Let’s see you.”

She did as asked, rolling them between her thumb and forefingers. Sighing with the tug that traveled down her nerves. He picked up his rhythm, driving her, in and in as he avidly watched the flush spread across her skin. “That’s my lass, come for me, Aeryn.”

Aeryn surfed on the wave of the first crash of feeling and then his tongue bared down and he crooked the length of his fingers inside and she felt blackness fluttering around her as the breath left her and spiraling lightning locked her muscles in a spasm of pleasure. "Sebastian!" He kept up his rhythm until she finished shuddering, falling still and limp and only then slid his fingers from her. She lay for a minute, only the soft rise of her chest indicating that she was still with him. 

He went to clean his hands, but Aeryn caught him. She drew his fingers to her mouth and sucked along their length, cleaning the taste of her juices from him with a gleam in her eyes and drawing a grunt of delayed want as the sensation coiled in his balls. "Not done yet, oh prince.”

As if she needed to remind him with his pulse like a drumbeat in his ears.

He'd shrugged out of his waistcoat at some point, but she was up on her knees in a whirl of motion and had his laces undone in a trice, freeing his thick length to her skilled hand. 

Her little thumb caressed his head, lingering along the slit and she smoothed a pearly drop of seed around. His cock jerked in her hand and he slapped her hand away. "You'll unman me before I've a chance to finish th' job, Aeryn." 

Her smirk was confidence fixing. "Not you, my love. You've the endurance of an ox." Her other hand drifted to his stomach to play along the line of reddish brown fur bisecting the taut muscle. 

“An ox. Well, there’s a lover-like compliment.” He paused from undoing his buttons to snuffle and snort into her hair, making her chuckle.

"Daft, beautiful man." Sebastian let her push the shirt off his shoulders before he pulled her, hand on her slender waist and the lush curve of her hip, to press against him as he bent his head to kiss her, sliding against her tongue with a soft moan tasting the echo of her tang on her lips. He explored the dark richness of her mouth and wanted to purr under her fingers, trailing curving trails along his sensitized skin. 

He burned with it, the want she spun up in him. He ached in her hand, where her palm was pressed against the length, his balls tight with need as her fingers stroked the delicate skin. "Want you. Maker, I want to be inside you, _now_ , Aeryn." Sebastian growled into her ear.

"Oh, yes." Eager, Aeryn slid back across the bed, the linens scratching as she moved. Her thighs spread wide to receive him and Sebastian slid his hands under her, gripping her hips to brace her. The thrill that never seemed to abate between them, had her panting again, desperate to have him. Caught in his bright eyes gone dark with want as he followed her, prowling on his knees, to wedge his hips between her thighs.

He hilted his cock in one smooth stroke as she tilted her hips to meet him, warm and welcoming. He'd heard of men seeking solace in the cradle of a woman's hips before and mocked it. But as they rocked together, as she stroked him with her hands and the blessed heat of her sheath and he drew the music from her white throat with each meeting, Sebastian understood it. Nothing but this bed and their joy, just now.

Aeryn's legs were strong and palely golden in the firelight as she held him to her, her body caressing him and inviting him to lose himself in the primitive undulation. Sweat beaded between them, sealing their flesh. 

Moaning as he filled her, the wide base of his cock stretching her entrance almost to the point of pain, the snap of his hips losing its smooth rhythm as he lost grasp of the control he cultivated…and it was almost always that which sent her over. Sebastian above all craved control but he never managed to command the wild need that bloomed between them. 

Sebastian went willingly, as she murmured assurances between her gasps of pleasure. He clasped her hands with his, pinning them to either side of her head. "Tell me, Aeryn." It was as much a plea as a lover's order, she knew. That small seed of doubt that never left him. 

Between almost punishing, pistoning drives, she managed to gasp, "I love you, Sebastian. Always. Forever...oh, _yes, there_..." 

Eyes on hers, he angled to make sure he caught her just where she…her eyes went wide and unfocused, _there we are_. Sebastian swiveled his hips between her flexing thighs, desperate to meet her need.

Aeryn’s head snapped back with a cry and the pulling, rippling of her orgasm caught him, tight walls around him and he managed a few more thrusts before he closed his eyes finally as the surge in his veins took him, utterly lost the rhythm and had to simply let go, flooding her womb with his seed. 

"Love you. Maker, if you ever leave me..." Chest heaving with the effort, he whispered into her tumbled, silken hair as he collapsed against her, trembling in her arms.

"Never. I swear it, my own." Aeryn whispered against his throat, soothing, the warmth of her voice stroking as much as her fingers along the sweat slicked, grooved muscle of his back.

Beyond the island of their bed, the tangle of their limbs and the fading fire, the rattling sleet turned slowly to snow as it fell against the palace walls. Drifting silently and starting to build in the crevasses of the window frame. Winter settled over Ferelden as they dozed and their companions made their way into the courtyard.

\---000--- 

As her breathing slowed, Aeryn considered the vulnerability Sebastian had shown in flashes, the worry he'd been running from. "Now that you've welcomed me back, why don't you tell me what's happened." He was still quiet, tracing the elegant lines of her back with one long finger, seeking out the divots of the dimples that graced the base of her spine. " _Now_ , love. Or I'll start to be worried and touchy."

He chuckled into her ear, but there was a sadness in the warm note of it. "I...think perhaps I've done something a wee bit irrevocable, _à ruin_."

"Why? What's happened?"

"Nothing...unexpected, I think, considering all the things I've seen and done. Just that I can no longer kneel quietly while the Grand Cleric prattles on about the evils of mages and the wickedness they are prone to, nor the evils that will befall Alistair for his determination to see them treated as people and not demons. Not and come home to you with honor in my heart and sit next to your sister at supper."

She pressed a kiss against his lean, stubbly jaw and whispered, "Tell me."

Smiling slightly at the reversal in their roles, Sebastian repeated...in a version edited of its worst offenses...the words the mother had spoken. "It was her tone, mostly. It makes me wonder if she's ever bothered to actually speak to a mage or to address her concerns in a more suitable manner. I was ashamed for her." There was a bitter quality in his words and it worried Aeryn. Sebastian's faith was important to him and it would hurt him to have to pull away from it like this. 

"Did you speak to Alistair?" 

"Aye. I...he's aware. Apparently the Grand Cleric has a long standing problem with him. It's why he maintains a separate chapel, here at the palace." 

Hesitantly, she asked, "Are you all right?" 

"Hmm?" Sebastian had been scowling, darkly, remembering the rush of rage that had flowed through him. 

Aeryn pushed up to see his face. "Are you _all right_? Sebastian, I know how deeply you believe. I know how hard it must have been to..."

But he was shaking his head. "It wasn't hard at all, _leannan_. Perhaps I should be ashamed of my temper and perhaps I will regret it...but...it's because of foolish, wrong-headed theology like Geneva's that things have deteriorated so far in the Circles." Sebastian touched her worried face and brushed his finger to smooth the line that had formed between her eyebrows. "I spent last night in contemplation as was appropriate. I think I've done rightly. I've confessed and done my penance. Alistair claims Revered Mother Beatrice is a good ear and it seems to be so." Swallowing hard, he continued. "I always knew, Aeryn, that choosing the path to Starkhaven would result in my having to make stands. To make choices that would not always be according to Chantry approval. All I can do is trust that the Maker will shine his light on my decisions. For I will not stand by and allow the clergy to denigrate mages like your sister and kings like Alistair."

Brave, darling man. Curling up onto her haunches, Aeryn took his hand in hers and pressed a kiss to the hard palm. "Thank you. Oh...Sebastian. I'm sorry it came this way...but...thank you for standing up to her." 

He gazed into her face. There was a fragility in her eyes, some glimpse of a woman who was still baffled at the idea that anyone but her would stand against the excesses of Chantry law, in defense of her sister. One reason why, he thought, she had been willing to let Anders run so far. So that she wouldn't be alone. He could not back down. He had to stand...just to deserve to stand beside her. But he also had to warn her.

"There might be consequences, Aeryn. It may be that...if it comes down to it, there may be no blessing from Val Royeaux on my right to rule. Goran may prove more acceptable to them. I have received no letter before, on my claim to the throne. But should word get to the Divine of this, it will never come. And there are Exalted Marches in the works."

Oh, no. She wouldn’t let that thought take hold of him. "Prince of Starkhaven or not, Sebastian Vael. That has nothing to do with my love for you. I would be an archer's woman marching in the army for our coin as a scout, as easily as a prince's, so long as that archer is you." And there was a warning growl in her tone that brought a proper smile to his face for the first time in days. 

"I know that, mo chridhe." And so, he did. But it was nice to hear, he would not deny. Blessed Andraste, thank you for bending my path to meet this woman's. He kissed his fierce lass firmly, chasing the steel from her eyes. 

Stroking his cheekbone, Aeryn cuddled into him, as if she'd never been anything but soft. "Anyway. It's good to be home, at least. No matter what seditious things you've been up to in my absence." Shouting at a Cleric, no less. Void, what a thing. She rested her head against the curve of his shoulder, closing her eyes and feeling the steady thud of his heart against her ear. In a few minutes she’d have to get up and get dressed again, but just for a minute she’d stay here, safe.

Sebastian just stopped himself from going stiff in shock. _Home_. He'd not ever heard her use that word, except in jest. Kirkwall had never been home. She'd never even casually referred to the Amell estate as home, as anyone else would. As he had, in the few months he'd lived there with her. 

He'd sworn himself to building her a home, but he'd meant Starkhaven. He'd meant _his_ home, that land of wide plain and river and mountain. Of wheat baking golden in the sun. Of lavender fields, the elegance of the city, and the old ways of the folk who lived on the heights.

But this was Ferelden, cold and wild, rougher and prouder than any city in the Free Marches. Aeryn had called it home. And he had to slap away the lonesome little boy’s voice in his head that whispered that she’d promised to come with him.


	15. Chapter 15

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  ** _Author's Notes:_** Sorry for the delay, holidays and 'flu put a crimp in my posting schedule. Thanks to mille libre for her excellent beta, though all mistakes are mine, of course.

Sebastian had no intention of letting his worry fester.  He'd just opened his mouth to ask Aeryn what she meant, if she truly considered Ferelden her home, when she sat bolt upright.

"Elves!"

That was something of a random thought and it sent his own flying like she'd skittled them.  "What?!"

She turned in his arms.  "Before you distracted me, that's what I meant to tell you.  The dwarven caravan master had been to Starkhaven not too long ago."

"Oh?"

"Yes.  Apparently there aren't any elves in the city. And...”

Sebastian interrupted her, "What?!  That can't be..."  In his memories, there were elves everywhere, the city elves; servants and tradesmen and even occasionally a wild, silent Dalish, come to trade. 

Aeryn talked over him, though.  "I know and then also, the Alienage has burned." 

" _Maker_..."  All those people...

Trying to reassure him, she continued, "No...he said that it was empty.  That it was burned by order of Goran to deal with an infestation of vermin after the elves left it empty."

Sebastian stared at her, utter disbelief on his face.  "Aeryn...there were...Elves are as common in Starkhaven as they were in Kirkwall.  We have the largest Alienage in the Marches.  I can't imagine Starkhaven...the estates alone, as servants to run them."  Shaking his head, "You've misunderstood or..."

"I wish I had.  And dwarves are thin on the ground, as well."  Aeryn gazed at him solemnly.  This had him more worried than she'd expected. 

He ran a distracted hand through his hair, tangled from their earlier romp.  "I don't...surely someone should have thought to tell me of this.  Did he mention anything about mages?"  Recalling his meandering thoughts from yesterday.

"No, and I didn't think to ask.  I did scribble down what he said."  Aeryn reached over the edge of the bed and snagged her rucksack with a limber stretch, sorting through the contents and bringing up one of Varric's bound chapbooks.  She handed it to Sebastian and he read the page.  "Perhaps I should have asked him to return with us, so you could speak to him."

"Six months ago.  Before we left Kirkwall."  It had been after the letters he'd received from certain parties.  And he hadn't directly spoken with any of the nobles.  Laird Robard of Raven's Reach was rarely in the city unless called by business, preferring his own estate.  One of his sisters, Sebastian recalled, was in charge of the villa in Starkhaven proper.  But, still.  No.  If he was asking for a sign from the Maker, then this was as clear as he was like to get.  "Aeryn...I know it's risky to chance the voyage in winter.  Is it possible though, that we might..."

Aeryn anticipated his question.  "Move things up?"  When Sebastian nodded, concern etched in the worried creases around his eyes, she agreed, "Let's talk to Isabela."  The wind of the storm picked up outside the cased window, moaning with damp and sighing along the eaves, as if to remind them of the dangers of winter travel on the Waking Sea.  Snow skittered against the glass.  They listened to it for a moment, Aeryn with her head tilted and Sebastian with his eyes closed before he spoke again. "It's not impossible.  Alistair's mentioned that Robard is in Ferelden visiting another of his family.  He intended to come here for Satinalia along with Aldric of Cleve.  It's a small hamlet just outside of Starkhaven, used to stage grain shipments along the Minanter,"  Sebastian edified at Aeryn’s questioning look.  "And surely they meant to go back before spring."  

"Well, even if Isabela can't get the _Siren_ shipshape in time, maybe we could travel with them."

Sebastian frowned.  "I had hoped to keep them clear of any outright association with me and my cause.  In case things don't go so well, I had hoped that they might be spared repercussions, especially from the Chantry.  If I turn up on the doorstep with their assistance..."

"Sebastian."  Aeryn's low voice was tinged with warning.  "You can't expect to do this without support.  And it's their decision.  We'll ask at least."  She bit her lip.  _Ah, Void.  I'm not the leader of this._ "I mean...I would advise that..."

Sebastian blinked at her sudden backstep.  Aeryn was rarely hesitant to make her opinion clear, but there was a new, slightly confused air about her and it took him a moment to realize why.

His hand covered hers and long fingers tipped her chin up and Aeryn looked back into the warm, gentled lines of Sebastian’s face, firelight gilding him and the soft crinkles at the corners of his eyes. 

His voice was smooth and sure, "As my lady and long before that, my true friend, your advice is always welcome.  Dinna ever hesitate to give it, _mo chridhe_.  And expect me to be man enough to take it, as sensible as it usually is.  You’re right.  If Isabela cannot accommodate us, I must ask Laird Robard."

She pulled up onto her knees and kissed him, softly, her fingers tracing his jaw. 

Not to begrudge her any tokens of affection, but…"What's that for, then?"

"If I need a reason, for being you."  He smiled again as she patted his chest and slid out of bed to dress hurriedly in the chill of the room, stepping lightly on the cool, smooth boards of the floor. 

\---000---

Fenris had knocked on their door before Sebastian was dressed and Aeryn had gone out to hear the news.  "I'm afraid there's no sign of Macie, Aeryn."  Bethany sighed wearily, plucking at her sodden robes. They'd left their cloaks down in the vestibule, but the rain and sleet had penetrated even the thickly woven, enchanted wool.

"Yeah, I didn't really expect there would be.  I'm sorry the weather turned on you."  Aeryn followed Bethany back to her room after checking Fenris over with a careful eye.  He had shaken his head, exasperatedly, splattering  Aeryn with icy droplets of melted snow entirely accidentally, Aeryn was sure before padding into his room.

Harry had already called for maids and an elven woman was filling Bethany's bath from two steaming buckets as the two sisters tugged Bethany's rain-soaked robes off.  Aeryn wadded them up, with a glance at the shredded hem.  "I hope you weren't attached to these.  I think they're ruined."

"I was afraid of that.  I'm going to have to find a different style while we're here.  Shorter.  Or something with leggings.  Too breezy by half."  Bethany chafed her damp, icy skin.  She'd kept Fenris, Varric and herself from freezing with a few decently placed warming spells for most of the hike, but she hadn't been able to keep up the last mile or so without taking a chance on lighting them on fire.  That wouldn't have endeared her to Fenris.  Though why she cared about that, Bethany was too tired to puzzle out.

Aeryn grabbed a linen towel from where it was warming by the fire and started rubbing Bethany's long, dark hair dry, telling her of what she and Sebastian had discussed. 

"So, we're off to Starkhaven, then?" 

"We'll talk to 'Bela, but yes, probably.  Sebastian's worried."

"There you are, m'lady."  The girl dipped a curtsey and took Bethany's ruined robes to dispose of.  "I'll go and get you a bit of dinner."

"Thank you, Sarri."  They watched the slim maid leave.  "It's strange, how easy it is to get used to it all.  Someone to run and fetch at the least notion you might want something."  Bethany grinned at Aeryn.  "Though, you've had that for years, now."

"It wasn't quite the same," Aeryn protested.  "I did most of my own running and I took my share of the housework.  I've been chased out of the kitchens here twice, now.  Weren't there servants at the Gallows?"  Bethany hadn't spoken of her day to day life in Kirkwall's Gallows often and Aeryn had hesitated to bring it up, but she couldn't deny her curiosity.

"Mostly Tranquil."  Bethany said quietly.  "We...tried not to need them, to keep our quarters ourselves.  The baths were runeworked, though."  She stripped off her smalls behind the screen and slid into the bath as Aeryn set her sister's boots out and pulled items out of Bethany's soaked backpack to dry by the fire.

Bethany’s face was shadowed in the firelight, but there was something pensive about her and Aeryn decided to back off and leave the heavy questions to another day. "Do you want robes, a dress or just night things?  You probably ought to just have a nap after you eat."

"Aeryn..."  Bethany grumbled at her sister's attempt at coddling, but then a yawn nearly split her face. "Fine.  Night things,"  she conceded as Aeryn chuckled and pulled out a long flannel gown and a pair of knitted stockings.  Beth had always suffered from cold feet.

"Can I leave you to it, or are you like to fall asleep and drown before Sarri gets back with dinner if I don't stay and scrub your back?"  She ducked a thrown sponge with a chuckle and slipped out the door.

Sebastian was chatting with Harry when Aeryn emerged.  He'd been smiling when she left him, but the worried frown was back again.  "Aeryn, Alistair's had a message he'd like to share with us." 

"Right.  Harry, tell them where we are, if they come looking, alright?"  Aeryn waved her hand towards the quarters of the others.

"Of course, m'lady."

Alistair was in his study, pondering a piece of black stationery, while Dierdre reclined on the small settle next to the fireplace, a woven throw pulled over her legs and tucked around her.  He glanced up as the guard held the door open for Sebastian and Aeryn.  "Oh, good.  I'd heard you were back, Hawke.  Any luck on your search?"

Aeryn shook her head.  "No.  She's got a knack for disappearing, anyway."

The king nodded absently, "Hmm.  Let me know if you change your mind about wanting help from the guard.  Zevran just sent me this…thought we should look at it together."  He fell to staring at the piece of paper again and they stood uncomfortably for a minute until Dierdre spoke.

"My lord, you did call them here to do something besides watch you contemplate, I'm sure."  Her voice was gentle and teasing and Alistair grinned. 

"You're right, m'dear.  Sorry about that.  I was deciding whether I should show you this.  It's something of a state secret, you know.  But...since you didn't bring your sister or Mistress Merrill..."  Aeryn raised a surprised eyebrow at this statement and Alistair explained.  "It's not the secret, but...well, let me show you."

He popped his neck and closed his eyes, concentrating.  Aeryn and Sebastian traded a curious glance and then a small flash of light swept over the king's desk, forcing them to cover their eyes.  When they looked back up, Alistair was frowning at the paper again, but now it was light grey and covered in script.

"Hmph.  Used to have better control than that.  Out of practice."

Aeryn couldn't help her astonishment and was glad that she hadn’t armed herself beyond a belt knife.  The power Alistair had just released would have had her daggers drawn.  "Was that a Cleanse?"  Void, no wonder he hadn't wanted Bethany or Merrill in the room. 

"Just a small one.   Could have been smaller," the former Templar had a slightly sheepish tone in his voice.

Sebastian was looking at the paper, just as astonished.  "Alistair, what sort of paper is that?"

"Invention of a dwarf that Lyna took to Kinloch, back during the Blight.  Dagna.  She wasn't a mage, 'cause well, she's a dwarf, but Irving let her study with the Tranquil and she's come up with quite a few interesting things.  This is one of the more useful.  The paper has a type of lyrium in it when it's made.  The ink uses silverite powder, after it dries it's invisible.  And then when you hit it with a Cleanse, up it comes."  Alistair pushed the paper across the desk towards Dierdre, who had gathered paper and quill.  "There you go, see what you make of it.  It's also coded in Antivan.  Dierdre's got a knack for code."  He explained to the other two as the queen worked, striking out something with a shake of her head and starting again.

"This is...Maker, this is quite the tool of state.  I can see why you'd keep it a secret."  Sebastian edged closer to the desk to see the paper. 

"Well, at the moment, it's only of use if you've got Templar abilities.  We keep it between Kinloch and me and then I gave some of the paper and ink to Zevran and Meridan.  Meri hates to use it, though.  She says it makes her itch."  Dierdre's quill stopped scratching briefly, as if she was thinking and then continued, her tawny head bowed over her work.

Finally, she pushed the translation back to to her husband.  "That's the best I can do.  Where did Zevran learn his writing skills?”

"Brothel, I think."  Alistair perused the message, the disturbing nature of its contents clear in the consternation on his handsome face.  "Wow.  Okay.  I asked him to look into the whole blood mage assassin thing.  He says there are rumors all over Northern Thedas about a group of mages hiring out as assassins to the rich.  No one noticed so much in Antiva, but he’d been investigating a few…ah… _contracts_ he calls them, that he had no part in.  He’s since gotten word of similar inconsistencies in Orlais.  One in Jader, too.   The killer arrested in the last few have been...Maker.  It's been a loved one, a sweetheart accused.  Once it was a child." 

Void, Aeryn thought.  "Well, that's sodding disturbing.  And no trace of the blood mages after?"

"Just like here."  Alistair grimaced.  "Only in almost all of the others, it's ended in execution for the killer.  Even after they'd protested innocence."  Aeryn took the translation the king offered, holding the oddly heavy paper so that Sebastian could read it as well. 

"On the upside, there's never been a second attempt, so far as he knows, if the first one failed."  Aeryn tilted her head.  "Well, I suppose Zevran Aranni would know from assassins."  He'd sussed her out, easily enough. 

"That he would, since he runs a good number of them, himself."  Alistair reminded her with a wry smirk.  "He's promised to keep an ear out and I can't ask for more than that." 

"We've some news of our own."  Sebastian ran down what Aeryn had told him about Starkhaven.

"They burned down the Alienage?" 

Aeryn nodded. "So Cordin claimed."  But Alistair was shaking his head.

"I've heard nothing of that.  I'd have said, Sebastian." 

Sebastian raised his hand, waving the king off.  "Aye, I've no doubt of that, Alistair.  I've had no word of it through my other channels, either."

"I could ask Bann Shianni, but she's keeping close to home these days.  She's due with her second any day now.  Still, I'll have a message sent. I'd like to think she'd have told me of trouble like that if she knew about it, but...well, they still like to fix their own problems in the Alienage.  You can’t really blame them.    Micah!"  Alistair called in his secretary.  

"Yes, Your Majesty?"

"I need notes sent to Bann Shianni and the three Marcher ambassadors, asking whether they have any information on the Starkhaven Alienage."

Sebastian added, "Or any news of what's happened to mages in Starkhaven, since the Circle burned in ’32.” 

Micah waited for Alistair to acknowledge the extra question and once he had the nod, the young man withdrew with a polite bow.  “Excuse me, sire.  Your Highnesses, My Lady Hawke.” 

Aeryn shook her head at the mouthful of honorifics.  Sodding black Void, when had her company gotten so elevated?  It made her twitchy in a way she hadn’t felt in years.  Back when she had just joined the Red Iron when, despite her father’s training and the kills she had made to defend Bethany’s secrets, she was still just learning the ropes of being an assassin.  Of killing for hire.  Of being among people for whom that was normal. 

Ah, well.  Another mask to learn, though with any luck it wouldn’t be quite as bloody in the training. She swallowed a small sigh.  She needed a fight.  And a drink.  And possibly another of both.  Isabela might have one of each, in the offing at least.  Or…

“Alistair…I don’t suppose you have any troubles I could attend to for you?  My lot will be getting rusty if we don’t get a bit of work in.”  She ignored Sebastian’s quizzical glance.

“To be honest, Hawke, it’s been quiet since we executed that conspirator.  Petty crime and such.  The worst lot are keeping their heads down.  And forgive me if I say your talents would be a touch…extreme for pickpockets.”

He wasn’t wrong. 

She gave the king her crooked smile but Sebastian noticed that her dimple, that small signatory of a real smile, never showed.  He was, he thought, perhaps finally becoming proficient at reading the tiny hints Aeryn let slip.   So, what was this? 

Fenris was slouching against the squared column outside of Alistair’s study.  Micah was occasionally, rather mouseishly, eyeing the lean elf who was watching him work.  It was only curiosity on Fenris’ part.  He was a good enough reader, but his writing still lacked ease and it was something of a fascination to him that the young man could happily earn a living doing little else. 

Beside him,Sebastian watched Aeryn’s smile go sly. 

“We’re off to see Isabela, Fenris.  If you find yourself unable to sleep.” 

“Have we a mission, then?”  Fenris wondered. 

“No…just a bit of information about the blood mages.  We can fill you in along the way.”

“Is there some reason, or are you just wanting to visit the docks?”

“I _have_ been missing the smell of fish, recently,” Aeryn mused and gave a wicked smile to Fenris’ shudder.  “But no.  Sebastian wants to move up our departure.  We need to see what ‘Bela thinks.”

Fenris was quiet as he fell in beside them, striding through the palace with some familiarity, now.  Outside the palace gates he finally spoke.  “I do not think she will be amenable to travelling in the winter, Hawke.  While it was the Qunari who destroyed her first ship, it was due to the storms that they were able to catch her at all and that she lost so many men.”

 _Flames._   Aeryn had forgotten that.  “You’re probably right.  We likely have an alternative, though.”

“Oh?”

“Aye…there are Starkhaven nobles in Ferelden right now.  We could travel with them, if necessary.”

“I see.”  There was something unsettled in Fenris’ gaze.  Was he worried about leaving Isabela? 

Aeryn kept her eyes open as they travelled through Denerim.  Macie was still in the city somewhere, she was almost positive.  But she saw no sign of the girl among the few folk who had braved the chill and snow.  Sighing inwardly, Aeryn hoped that the scamp had at least managed to find a warm, sturdy bolt-hole.  _Bloody palace to spend the winter in and she picks_ _a back alley, instead_ ,  Aeryn mused.  _Ah well, good on her._

The docks were quiet.  The storm had abated, but the ships and their crews were still battened down.  Only one was being unloaded, a shipment of spices from the north, if accents and grumblings about the weather were any indication. 

The _Siren’s Call II_ was a sad sight.  The mainsail mast was still down and some of the planking had been stripped away.  Where the planking wasn’t missing entirely, the paint was being scoured off.  The pirate queen herself was up in the rigging, untangling something.  Spying them she gave a shout, “Hawke, get that sweet arse up here.  I need your nimble fingers.”

“Aye aye, Captain Isabela, ser.”  Aeryn ran up the gangplank leaving Sebastian and Fenris behind her to follow in her wake, Sebastian smiling fondly and Fenris with a shake of his head.  She jumped up and snagged the first spar, scrambling up the lines like a monkey.  Sebastian couldn’t help a chuckle watching her execute a flip over one of the higher spars before she settled besides Isabela.  She was like a child let out to play in a meadow after being cooped up in a schoolroom all day, the unabashed smile on her sweet face sending a coil of warmth through him despite the bitter wind off the water.

The knots had swollen in the damp and some were completely iced over.  They worked for a few minutes as Sebastian and Fenris greeted the crew and were put to work, as well, Sebastian on a lower spar working on yet more knots and Fenris shifting the heavy weight of water-soaked, frozen coils of rope. 

Isabela paused to warm her hands, tucking them under her arms.  “Not that I don’t appreciate the help, but what brings you out on a raw day?  Did you find the kid?”

“No.  Not even a glimmer.  She’s holed up here in the city somewhere.  We’re here on business, actually.”

“Always business with you, these days.  Never a spark of fun.  You’ll end up old and grey before your time!”

Aeryn grinned, “Aww, now.  This doesn’t qualify as fun?”  She stretched out a kink in her shoulders.

“Could be, if you weren’t wearing all those clothes.”  Isabela eyed Aeryn’s heavy woolen cloak, tucked around her leathers.  Isabela was wearing an oilcloth slicker, but no other consideration for the weather.

“Even I have a bit of respect for winter, ‘Bela.”  Aeryn bit her lip, clearly hesitating and Isabela smirked.  Hawke hated asking favors.

“Alright, out with it.  Worst I can do is say no, right?”

“Yeah, you’re probably going to.  So, how long do you figure before the _Siren_ could be sea worthy?”

Isabela arched her eyebrow and looked at Aeryn as if she’d lost her mind, which clearly, considering the construction around her, she had.  “Um.  Sometime after First Day, like we discussed.  Hawke, I’ve got her stripped and gutted.  We’re having to replace almost all of the decking.  Alistair’s shipwright is a miracle worker…but…shit, there’s no way it’ll happen before Guardian.  We’ve even had to make new sails.  Castillion took lousy care of his lady, despite his fascination with fancy trappings.”

Grimacing, Aeryn shrugged.  “Had to ask.”  She gave Isabela the rundown on the situation in Starkhaven.  “We have to go, sooner than we planned.  Sebastian’s right.  There’s something rotten going on.” 

“I can ask around…see who’s sailing with his nobles.  If they’re a crew you can trust in a storm.”  Isabela glanced back down at the knot, fiddling expertly until it came loose.  “I can’t come, though, Hawke.  I…I’m not ready to be landlocked again and I won’t leave my ship.”

Aeryn worked her knot as well.  “I know,” she answered quietly, eyes carefully on her fingers. 

“Fuck.”  Isabela growled.  “You can’t just wait until spring?  How much worse could it get in four months?”

“Kirkwall.”  Aeryn’s answer was wry enough, but Isabela could see the wrinkle between her red brows  get deeper. 

With a mirthless laugh, Isabela reminded her, “Eventually, you have to find another reason to be all heroic.”

Pausing her work for a minute, Aeryn looked out over the port, out to the horizon obscured by the flat grey sky meeting the still water at the edge of the harbor.  “He’s ready to go, ‘Bela.  Sebastian stayed in Kirkwall for me...for Elthina, too, I know.  But for me, to stand with me, keep me steady.”  Looking back, she fixed the pirate with a flash of steel.  “And if horrible things have happened in his city, because he stayed away for me to help me try and save Kirkwall…I won’t do any less for him.  If he’s ready to be Prince, then I will _make_ it happen.”  _Whatever it takes._

Isabela’s golden eyes widened at the threat underneath the oath of devotion and had she been a praying woman, she’d have said one for the innocents who might stand between the prince’s assassin and his enemies.  Someone ought to make sure Sebastian had a good grasp of what Hawke was capable of, in the dark.  And then there was…

“I suppose Fenris and Varric will be going along.”

Aeryn wasn’t fooled by Isabela’s casual supposition, but she had mostly stayed out of the relationship between the pirate and her best friend and wasn’t planning on interfering now.  “Fenris seems to be on board.  Varric was sleeping when we dropped into the tavern.  I’ll check again on the way back, but he’s said before he’ll be coming along for whatever adventures we manage to find ourselves entangled in.  And I think he’s ready to go back to the Marches.  Merrill…may be staying in Ferelden.  You might keep an eye on her.”

“Why would Merrill stay in Ferelden on her own?”

“You’ll have to ask her, ‘Bela.  I don’t know for sure.” 

“Well, I will then. “  Isabela stabbed the blunt tool she’d been using as a lever into a space between two lines.  “Sod this, I’m frozen all the way through.  Let’s go wake up Varric and have a drink on his tab.”

 

 

 

\---000---

Varric was already awake when the foursome strode into the Gnawed Noble.  He’d taken a suite as he had in Kirkwall, but the dining room off the bar, with its roaring fire and occasional company, was more to his liking.  The table in the back was already his and they were able to follow a spate of laughter back to him, once they’d collected their drinks.  Varric’s audience was amenable enough to move and allow his companions to join him.

For once, Aeryn let herself be pulled into a game of Diamondback.  She almost never played, Sebastian had noticed not long after he’d joined her crew, preferring to watch and comment and keep the table’s drinks topped up.  Fenris had simply dealt her in tonight, though and she’d rolled her eyes and picked up the cards.  “Why do you do this to yourself?”

He shrugged.  “You’ve not been hunting in a while, Hawke.  Think of it as taking the edge off.”

Aeryn went about the game as though she was indeed stalking prey, her face cool and impassive, her movements precise and Sebastian wondered if that’s what kept her from enjoying it.  She was a wee bit conservative in her bidding, too, which surprised him a little, knowing her interest in risk.  Nonetheless, she had the more experienced players on their toes.  He and Varric were out of the first game in three draws and Isabela was only in because of cheating.

“Varric…I wonder if I could ask your advice?”

Varric raised his eyebrows and turned away from the card game.  “Sure, Choir Boy.  What can I do for you?” 

Sebastian looked at his tumbler a moment before continuing.  Time grew short and this was the closest to a plan he’d come to.  “I was…considering how best to go about taking the throne.  I’d prefer not to start a war, if I can manage.”

“I’m a lot of things, kid, but I’m not a general.”  Varric figured it was best to be blunt. 

But Sebastian was nodding.  “Aye, that’s one of the reasons I think you’re the man to talk to.  Alistair, he’s done well here.  Why do you figure?”

Varric steepled his fingers and leaned back.  “Well, beyond the fact that Fereldens seem pretty attached to the Theirins, as far as heroic figures go, you aren’t gonna do better than a hero who lost his first love while defeating the Blight.  It gives folks a reason to give you a chance.  And despite noble pretentions, it’s the common folk who keep a king on his throne.  If the rabble’s with you, there’s not a lot of room for unrest to start.”

“I think so, too.”

“You aren’t thinking of waiting for another Blight, though?”

Sebastian’s chuckle drew Aeryn’s attention and he waved her back to the game.  “No, I would not wish for such a thing.  But there are other ways to gain a people’s confidence.  I…well, you’ve heard the tales I’ve told about my past.  I do not think I could just walk into Starkhaven and have such confidence given to me.  The rumors of my behavior didn’t endear me to anyone.”

“Yeah, If you were half the rascal you claim, I can see why you’d hesitate to just say, ‘Hey, I’m home now where’s the crown.’

“I may even have underplayed my past, to be honest.  But there are troubles in the surrounding countryside, bandits and marauders.  If we…I was to come in and only claim to be leading a bit of a clean-up.  If we were to do for Starkhaven’s outlying villages what Aeryn used to do for Kirkwall…”

Andraste’s tits.  Choir Boy actually had a good idea.  “You might find yourself in a better reputation and if anyone accused you of plotting a coup, you could ask what was so subversive about protecting the peasantry?”  Sebastian nodded and a pleased look spread over his face when Varric grinned.  “Damn, kid.  That’s sneaky.  I like it.”

“Ah, good.”

“And I suppose having a certain story teller along to spread rumors and sing a song or two wouldn’t come amiss?”

“I had hoped you and Bianca would join us.”

“Wouldn’t miss it.”  A speculative look crossed the dwarf’s handsome face.  “You know, there’s the Tourney coming up.  If you’re of mind, you could make a showing in the Archery.  That would set people buzzing a little, too.”

“I…had thought of that.  I hope we will be well on our way to Starkhaven by then, though.  And the Tourney’s held in Ansburg, this year.”

Shrugging, Varric finished his drink.  “Something to keep in mind, anyway.  Yeah.  I like it.  You might even manage to make a decent prince with that sort of devious.  You keep thinking like that and I’m gonna have to come up with a new nickname.  What do you think, Hawke?”  Unable to contain her curiosity, once the game had ended, she’d drifted up behind them.

Aeryn had a look of curious interest on her face, as she slid newly earned coin into her purse.  “I think I always knew he was a proper rogue.  Why not take advantage of our talent?”  Her smile was warm and Sebastian grinned.

“Yes, all smiles now that she’s set us in the poor hous,”  Isabela grumbled. 

There was a small clatter at the door, drawing their attention and Aeryn was surprised to see one of Alistair’s messengers picking herself up from a collision with a tavern patron.  The girl dusted herself off and limped towards their table, note in hand.

She was breathless, barely able to voice her message after running the king's order through the city.

"My... lady...Hawke..."

Aeryn straightened from where she'd leaned into Sebastian's side, his no longer, but the Champion with sharp eyes.  "Yes?"

The young woman answered, "The king calls for your aid.  There are slavers in the city.  He wishes them...intercepted."  She handed over the message and Aeryn scanned it.

Glancing over her band, she had to smile at the interest in their eyes and the eager tension in Fenris' lean body.  "The king wishes them to be taught a lesson.  Hanging was apparently too good for the last lot.  Anyone need anything?"

Varric jerked his chin towards the bar.  "Matelin keeps a few things stashed behind the bar.  Potions and such."

....

There were eyes on them as they left the tavern and whispers behind them.  Varric's stories had done their work as well as rumors about the assassins at Queen Dierdre's dinner and the prince’s confrontation with the Grand Cleric.

An old man, once a dockworker from the gnarls of his fingers and his weathered face, glanced at the group as they left the tavern.  "Who's that lot, then?"

The barman answered, "That's the Hawke, King's new blade.  She and hers are going hunting, looks like."

"Maker help whoever it is."  They’d made no attempt to hide the weapons they bore.

"Slavers," came the answer from the barmaid as she sat the tray of their used glasses on the bar.  “King Alistair sent ‘em, personal.”

The oldtimer grinned, toothless and hard. "Oh, well.  Void take'em, then."

\---000---

Alistair had sent a guard to escort Bethany and Merrill to the city gate to meet Aeryn and the others and to deliver a further scout’s report. 

They made their way to a valley just south of the city, where information had indicated the slavers could be found, taking advantage of a nest of caverns. 

Merrill was playing bait as the dense forest closed around them.  It was a trick they’d used before.  Lone elves were always a draw for trouble and Merrill had learned the part well, picking her way hesitantly along the path while Aeryn followed silently in the shadows not too far away for aid, in case something unusual came into play.

They skirted the path around the northern edge of the valley, and Aeryn slipped further ahead to count the figures illuminated by the campfire.  It was a well-chosen spot.  Had they not had Alistair’s scout’s report, Aeryn didn’t think she’d have found it.   Quite a large band, too, twenty.  Hopefully, they’d caught them before any of their number had peeled off to hunt farther inland. 

Merrill turned back, just past a small clearing as if changing her mind about going farther in the gloom of the evening.  She’d stopped to pick up wood, here and there, and set to making a small fire, speaking softly to herself as the others picked vantage points to wait.

Just as Aeryn wondered if they might have paused too early, she heard a clanking and a shuffling of booted feet in the thin, icy-crisp snowfall that had made it through the trees to filter onto the leafmold.  Armor, like none of hers wore, since Aveline was no longer with them.  She could feel the smile curl across her face.  Nothing like slavers to take the edge off, properly.  Fenris should have waited and kept hold of his coin.  Trouble always found them, sooner or later.

He was there, just across the way, ready to slam into the clearing in a blaze to draw the eye while she and Isabela would pick around the edges.  Isabela preferred the one on one, she’d draw her victim off like a trap spider luring a roach.  And leave it to Aeryn to roll the edges, harrying them closer to Fenris and his sweeping blade.  With any luck, Sebastian and Varric, Merrill and Bethany could just quarter off the rest.

A heavy rustle in the brush just to the side, now.  And she had to give them credit, far more subtlety and patience than Kirkwall’s slavers had ever shown. 

The attack when it came, was disappointing at first.  They’d sent only two in, masked as Tevinters often were.  Then again, one elf.  Probably hadn’t seemed much of a bother. 

They might have to change technique here in Ferelden, Sebastian thought.  Apparently the slavers in Kirkwall had relied more on overwhelming force, showing their numbers too early.  He had found a small rise to stand on, just at the opening of the clearing.

“Be still, knifey.  We’re going to take you to the city.”

“Oh, no thank you.  I just came from there.  I’m going south to join the Dalish, you see,”  Merrill chattered back. 

“Have you heard of Minrathous, pretty thing?”  The other was circling around Merrill as the taller slaver tried to lull her into ignoring his companion.  Had she been closer, Aeryn would expect to hear Fenris snarl.

“You shouldn’t be here.  King Alistair doesn’t care for Tevinters, I hear.” 

“Don’t matter what the bastard cares for.  We go where we will.”  And now, Sebastian knew, came the hard part.  Allowing them close enough to Merrill that she’d have been in danger, had she not already drawn up her spell while the fire covered the slight glow of her hands.

“That seems like a terribly pushy way of thinking.  I don’t think I’ll come with you.”

The man behind her sneered.  “You think we care what you want, either?”  Aeryn heard Bianca’s hushed ratchet as she picked her target.

Merrill was quite serious when she answered.  “You should, you know.  Not all little elves in the woods are easy to pick up as daisies, you see.”  A flick of her fingers had vines creeping silently towards the one in front of her, as Aeryn slipped up behind the other.  Tricky, this.  Had to let them make enough noise to draw out the others.  No cutting his throat.

With a reverse of her blade, Aeryn sliced the back of his knees, always a weak point in this sort of armor, thin cloth that the boots didn’t quite cover.  Deep enough to cripple, but not kill, and painful enough to make him howl as his friend was dragged into Merrill’s thorns, shrieking.

A rush of booted feet and the rest of the slaver force was piling into the clearing and Fenris made his charge.  Sebastian and Bethany closed in, one of Beth’s force spells dragging the stragglers into the carnage. 

An example Alistair wanted.  Then so would he get.  Aeryn grinned at Fenris as she ducked into a convenient bit of smoke from Merrill’s fire. 

Alistair’s guardtroop came up just as Aeryn and Fenris were dealing with the last.  The forward sergeant hailed them and Aeryn stepped up to talk.

The guardsman was glancing around, somewhat gobsmacked.  “King Alistair sent us as back-up, when he discovered the estimated size of the slaver band, m’lady.  But seems your bunch are as well able as you claimed.” 

“Thank you, sergeant.  Did the king want a survivor…I’m afraid we took his instructions fairly literally.” 

“No, Lady Hawke.  He intended to have them put down.”

Isabela had pulled a map off of one of the corpses.  She tilted it into the light.  “Here, this cove’s where they’ve got the ship stashed.”  Her finger traced a small crescent in the inked coastline.  “There’s a sheltered overhang.  Likely as not, you’ll find any one they’ve picked up already stashed there.”

The sergeant took the map with a bow.  “We’ll let you get back to the city, then, m’lady.”

Oh?  “You don’t want a bit more help?   We’re reasonably fresh, still.”

“King Alistair’s orders are to load the bodies onto the ship and then tow it north to the shipping lanes.  We’re to fire it, once we sight Tevinters.  Even if there are more of the blighters by the boat, my lads can take ‘em.” 

Aeryn frowned as Varric snorted behind her, “Yeah, that’s not gonna get their backs up.”

Sebastian shook his head.  It seemed foolish to him, as well.  But he was not going to question Alistair’s orders in front of his troops.  Aeryn, it seemed, had a similar hesitation.

She was inclining her head, formally.  “Alright, then.  We’ll leave you to it.”

“King Alistair did mention you were to be allowed to loot the corpses.  Says you have right of spoils and all.”

“Done that already.”  Isabela smirked, with her eye on the map the sergeant was still holding.  The man blushed behind his face guard.

“Yes, of course.”

“Good hunting, then, sergeant.”


	16. Chapter 16

The fight with slavers had taken the edge off, for all of them.  And Aeryn would be damned if she’d wish for more to avoid her newest duty.

Resigning herself, Aeryn smiled when Sebastian told her of the ambassador from the Lord Chancellor of Tantervale.  “Of course,” was her only answer when he asked for her company for the meeting.  She could.  He wanted her with him and she’d promised to try.  It was only a few hours. 

There was also the fact that she needed to _know_.  What they were saying of her, in the Marches.  What she would have to cover in order to give Sebastian the partner he needed.  Eyeing her clothes press, she had the maid that Alistair’s seneschal had assigned to her pull out the pale green silk dress she’d recently picked up from the seamstress.  With the deeper green sash, it was a modest enough outfit, and in the new style it was reasonably flattering.

Sebastian looked up in surprise at Aeryn’s attire, when she emerged from the dressing room.  “Ah.  Something new, then?”

“Well, you aren’t wearing your armor.  I thought perhaps I’d try something else, as well.”

Sebastian had decided against his armor for these meetings, it was true.  No need to give the eyes of Marcher nobles a reason to recall that Simeon Vael had sent his youngest to the Chantry, after all.  But he couldn’t recall ever seeing Aeryn in anything as…lady-like wasn’t the right word, she was always a lady, given the proper circumstances.  Appropriate to her station, perhaps.  It almost looked like something Leandra Hawke might have worn.

It looked not at all like anything the Champion of Kirkwall would wear.  Nor hisAeryn _,_ either who was fondest of darker colors and things she could fight in if need be.  But Aeryn’s eyebrow had gone up and something of hesitance had crossed her face as she turned to look at herself in the small mirror on the vanity, smoothing away a non-existent wrinkle.   Hastily, he told her, “It looks lovely.  I like green on you.”

Well, that’s a half-compliment if she’d ever heard one, but Aeryn hadn’t picked this to entice her lover.  She had other things for that.  She inclined her head, and gave a slight curtsey.  “Thank you, then.  Shall we?”  He took her arm and they made their way down to the hall.

Tantervale’s ambassador was, unfortunately, someone who’d known Sebastian, if only by reputation.  Anton Gant had been an acquaintance of his older brother, Lucas, when the two young men had attended the university in Orlais for a bit of polish.  Sebastian had no idea how close the two had been, nor if Lucas had ever even mentioned his youngest brother.  But Gant had been among those who sent letters of outrage to the Divine when the Vaels had been murdered and so little had been done to find the culprits.

He was nervous, Aeryn thought.  In Sebastian, it came out in a slight stiffness.  The brogue fell away to something more common and his face took on a certain austerity.  She pushed back her own discomfort, slid her mother’s best mask forward and then stroked his fingers with her own where his tanned strong hand had tightened slightly on her arm.  “You’re fine, Sebastian.  You’ve every right to meet with him.” 

He only had time to nod as Harry introduced them into the chamber, just ahead of Alistair.

 

Aeryn kept herself small and quiet as the talk progressed, better to observe this man who could make Sebastian so unsure.  He’d long since grown away from that, but this reminded her of the Sebastian she’d first met when her mother and sister had gone to Chant.  The Chantry brother, all his edges polished off and made bland.  His one spark had been that morning in the Chantry courtyard, defiant and angry, bow in hand, and she’d seen none of it again until she asked him to watch over Leandra and Bethany.

Whatever else Anton Gant was, he was a professional at his job.  His narrow, attractive face was smooth and his voice was smoother as he offered belated condolences to Sebastian for the loss of his family.  He bowed over Aeryn’s hand as she curtseyed and if he was surprised to hear her announced, he gave no sign.

The meeting itself went well.  Sebastian buried his nerves when Gant made no indication that he’d heard of Sebastian before, outside of his family name, and whatever had made Aeryn so nervous as to break out finery didn’t appear to be bothering her anymore, either.  She sat quietly, though her sharp eyes rarely left the ambassador, so long as he wasn’t looking at her.   When Gant did glance in her direction, she was almost always looking elsewhere.

Observation was what Aeryn could bring to this for Sebastian.  The ambassador was deft in his negotiations, but willing to compromise with the King.  There was nothing hostile in his approach and when Sebastian made a remark about the trade deficits between the countries Gant was gracious in his acknowledgement.  He didn’t come across as an enemy.  But, he was trained in speech and rhetoric.  More so than any of them.  It wouldn’t do to underestimate him.

She’d offered to pour tea when the maid brought it in and only now did Gant make any attempt to draw her into the conversation.  “My lady, I must say…you are not what I was expecting when I was told the Champion of Kirkwall would be attending.”

Sebastian tensed.  It was to be expected that Gant would know her name and the association, but why bring it up now?  Aeryn gave no sign that she saw anything awry.

Aeryn handed him his cup with a tilt to her head.  “Gracious, I’m almost afraid to ask what you might have been expecting, Serah.”

“One does hear _stories_ , you realize.  You have quite the fearsome reputation.  I was told to count my rings, even.  And most women who follow the blade are not…accustomed to the gentler battlefields of palace life.”

Alistair spoke up, “In Ferelden, we have a tradition of women who can fight as well as dance.  My grandmother, Moira, was one such, as was the Hero of Ferelden.”  And in that, Sebastian recognized a warning. 

Gant took it as such, bowing slightly. “Of course, Your Majesty.”

Aeryn, however, simply smiled at the man.  “One can’t put such weight on stories, Ambassador.”

“You did something to earn your title.  I can’t imagine a Qunari Arishok being cowed by a properly poured cup of tea.”

“No, you’re quite right.  That took some effort, group effort actually.” A small, feminine shrug.   “As I was the noble, I was the one chosen to be singled out.  But I was, for the most part, in the right place at the right time.  Or not, as the case may be.”  Sebastian winced inwardly.  He hated that she’d chosen to disavow the truth of the fight.  Why then?  She couldn’t imagine he was embarrassed by her, surely, nor her willingness to stand up to the Qunari?

“And again, in Orlais?”

Aeryn laughed lightly.  “Oh, that.  Maker, I hadn’t realized my little misjudgment had made gossip rounds.  I went to a party and made a foolish choice in…” she gave the ambassador a winning smile and he seemed unable not to smile back, “ _divertissement_.  Sadly, I was forced to defend myself when my companion turned out to be more than she appeared.”

“Oh, really?”  He glanced at Sebastian.  “I understood that you and, ah, _Prince_ Sebastian were already involved at that time.” 

Blinking, Aeryn replied, “Maker, no.  We…Prince Vael was still a brother in the Chantry, Ambassador.  It wasn’t until he withdrew his vows in order to pursue concerns that we attempted to…”  A flush crept across her cheeks.  “The Prince has long been one of my closest advisors, of course.  And, people do like to spread rumors.”  This was not what she wanted, to be the focus of attention.  But it seemed that comment had redirected the ambassador.

“I rather thought that the Prince was fighting alongside you for years.  Which did raise eyebrows, I admit, outside of Kirkwall.”  _Here we go, then_.  But she wondered at the storm building on Sebastian’s face.

“He accompanied me now and again, on appropriate concerns when he could.  As Champion I and my friends were often called upon to aid the people against threats.  A high dragon on one memorable occasion, and Prince Vael was a very great help.  His skill with the bow was not tarnished by his service to Andraste.”  My prince fought a high dragon, you arse.  Stack your precious noble eyebrows against that. 

Sebastian stood and approached them.  _Enough._   “Gant, perhaps you could simply ask me why I chose to help Lady Hawke.” 

With that, Gant turned on Sebastian with a satisfied smile and didn’t see Aeryn’s subtle shake of her head.  “One does wonder, I admit.”

“She aided me when no one else would investigate the murder of my family.  She and her companions destroyed the mercenaries who did the deed and when I finally uncovered the facts of the Harriman involvement, it was again Aeryn and her companions who came to my aid.”  Sebastian drew himself up and, with an apology to the Maker, took advantage of his height looking down his nose at the slim, slight ambassador.  “It was a matter of honor to assist her when she required it.” 

Gant’s smile had slipped away. 

“You yourself wanted the murders investigated.  Hawke is the reason the demon responsible could no longer influence the Harrimans.”

“A demon.”  There was a note of horror in the man’s voice.

“Yes.  A desire demon caused the trouble with Lady Harriman, leading to her husband’s death and the debauchery of her own family.  And to the deaths of mine.  And despite what you may have heard, Gant…I had no interest in gaining the throne any longer.  I served at the Chantry willingly for ten years and continued to do so until it became clear where my duty would lie.  There are many reports of the failure of my cousin Goran’s rule.  Had he been fit, I…no, I would not have continued in service.”  Sebastian didn’t like the way Aeryn had denigrated her own work.  He would make sure that Gant realized how he valued her.

“Once I began following Lady Hawke and realized her inestimable worth, I also realized I would have to leave my service.  I stayed as long as I did because of the instability in Kirkwall and the fact that Grand Cleric Elthina needed my aid, as well.  Once I realized Aeryn returned my regard, honor required that I withdraw.”   

“Honor.”  Gant glanced away and then back, with a smaller, more honest smile.  “Your brother also spoke so. “

His brother?  “Lucas, you mean?”

“Yes.  May I speak candidly?  He…I know you were not close, Your Highness.  But Lucas was a good man.  Young and brash on occasion, as were we all, but he spoke well of you when we were in Orlais.  His baby brother, who could walk a ridgepole on the roof of the Keep and out-shoot half the archers in Starkhaven by the time you were 12.  He was…disappointed when he and Meghan returned from their time in Navarre to discover that you’d…fallen into iniquity.”

Aeryn withdrew towards Alistair, with the excuse of freshening the king’s cup.  It wasn’t the way she would have gone about it, but the conversation was back to something much more conducive to improving Sebastian’s reputation.   The king seemed to understand her game, at least, and didn’t interfere.

Sebastian was answering, “I do not recall Lucas having an opinion of me one way or the other, so long as I was not pestering him or touching his things.”  Aeryn watched his hand come up to rub the back of his neck, to that small scar that lingered from his father’s beating.  No one else knew, though.  Concern flooded her as the conversation unfolded, fighting herself to be still and to not rush to defend him or protect him. 

“You were eight when he left to Orlais?  He changed a great deal in those years, before his marriage.  Grew up quite a lot.  And he went to Nevarra to spend time with Meghan’s family and to arrange that trade agreement.  He wrote me, told me he meant to make sure things changed for you, once he had some footing underneath him, once your father had officially named him heir.  But then…”

“Then I had already irrevocably damaged my name in my father’s court and it would have damaged him to bring me too close.”

 Gant nodded with a bit of regret, setting his tea down and folding his hands behind him.  “He was…concerned with his honor.  He did hope, when they sent you to the Chantry, that it would be good for you, but I think he was surprised to find that you did so well and more that you stayed.  He wrote me when you were named Chantor, that he’d never have guessed you would have found such a use for the training you found in taverns.  He had a new chantor’s box built at the Starkhaven Chantry, in case you were ever able to come and lead chant in your old home.”

Sebastian closed his eyes for a minute.  A gift from the Maker, years late, but no less sweet for its delay.  “Thank you for that.  I was not aware that any member of my family gave me another thought once I’d been removed from their sight.”

“Lucas did, Prince Vael.”  Sebastian’s head came up.  It was the first time Gant had addressed him as the official ruler of Starkhaven.  He missed the flash of triumph in Aeryn’s eyes behind him.  “You have the right to that, Your Highness.  Goran had little claim, even before he began to cut Starkhaven off from its allies.” 

Alistair stood at that, and spoke.  “I think that’s my cue.  I’ll go and leave you to discussions of Starkhaven.  Lady Hawke, would you attend me?”

What?  Leave Sebastian, but…Void there was no way to politely put off a king.  “Of course, Your Majesty.”

She managed to wait until they were out of earshot of the meeting chamber.  “Alistair, what….”

“He needs to stand on his own.  That’s what your little charade and that dress…did you borrow that from Dierdre?  It looks like something she’d wear to visit with the retired Mothers at the Chantry.” He shook his head, “But that’s what it was all about, right?”

“I did tell him he was better off without me in the room.”

“Well, yes, if you’re going to try and playact yourself into a reputation as a…a… _dilettante_.”  The man looked horrified.  

Aeryn set her chin.  “You have no idea, Your Majesty, what my reputation in the Marches is.  He needs me to push as much of that away as I can…”

“I think he’ll beg to differ with you, Hawke.”  Shaking his head, he tucked the hand she’d pulled away back into the crook of her arm and walked her towards her rooms.  “Look, I don’t…I _have_ been a king now for a while.  I’ve seen a lot.  But if you were just marrying the Prince of Starkhaven, heir to the throne, then yes, you might need to tone yourself down.  But you’re not.  You’re heading for a coup.  You need strength.  You need to establish yourself as someone the nobility can’t push around.  And passing yourself off as someone who just keeps finding herself in odd situations does not help that.”

She glared at him for a minute, but Alistair had some practice with that and did not flinch.  Finally, Aeryn sighed.  “You do realize, that’s almost entirely the whole story?  I just keep turning up at the right time and place.”

Alistair grinned at her.  “Yes, I do know something of that, myself.  The vapid woman you were trying to push off as wouldn’t have turned those situations into opportunities, though.  And…not all the nobles are dumb enough to believe it.  They’d just wonder what else you were up to.  And that is dangerous.”  That last was said soberly and Aeryn nodded.

The king’s voice was curious when he continued.  “Does Sebastian hold it against you, your past?”

Startled, Aeryn looked back up at him.  “No!  No, of course not.  Less than he should, probably.”

“Well, then.  Why care what anyone else thinks?”

Aeryn’s smile went dark and wry.  “You know better than that, Your Majesty.  Reputation counts for something in your circles.  I will _not_ be held against him as a sign of his bad judgment.   Better a _dilettante_ bride than one who’s murdered and thieved her way across the Marches and into the nobility.”

“Aeryn.”  Sebastian’s horrified voice behind her had her whirling.  He’d come up the back stairs, as soon as he’d withdrawn from Gant, wanting to know what she’d been thinking.  And now he knew.

“Maker’s Void, Sebastian!  I’m not the one who needs a bell.” 

But he was having none of it, the tone of his brogue gone low and dangerous.  “Alistair.  Will you excuse us, please?”

The king gave a slight bow.  “Of course.”

Aeryn drew herself up, more than a little annoyed at the two men’s highhandedness.  “I have an appointment.  I’m going to change and then…”

Sebastian took her hand with disarming gentleness drawing her over to the low settee by the window.  The snow had stopped falling, there were soldiers practicing in the courtyard beneath them, the noise enough to cover their low conversation.  “No.  You are going to sit with me and tell me what devious, convoluted idea made you think I needed to have an empty-headed noble…”  He took a breath.  “For the love of all that’s holy, Aeryn.  When did I ever…Is it something I’ve said, then?  Have I hurt your feelings or…”

Frustrated, she shook her head.  Why was he being so dense?  “No, it’s nothing you’ve done.  I’m trying to be realistic, here.  I know how Kirkwall’s nobility thought of me, Sebastian.  I know what I saw in Orlais.  What will Starkhaven think of you, if I’ve not managed to warp the idea of my background a little by the time we get there?  If we’re leaving within the month, I have to push…”

“And then what?  What?  Will you live like that for the whole of our lives, pretending to be less than you are in public?”  Her eyes were level on his, and he knew that yes, that was exactly what she’d thought.

“It’s not like I’d be the first.”  Aeryn searched Sebastian’s face trying to figure out why he was so angry.  Surely he’d known that there would have to be measures taken to abate the rumors about her?

Fury built up in him… that she’d ever thought he’d not notice.  “D’ya take me for a fool, then?  Do you think I want that, that I’d not ever question…”  Sebastian sucked in a breath, shocked.  That’s what she’d done at the Birth Rock, when the mother blessed them and he’d knelt there like an idiot and let her pretend.  He could see bewilderment on her face.  It wasn’t that she thought he wouldn’t notice; it was that she thought it was right.  _Maker, help me, guide my words_.

“I dinna want that.  Aeryn.  I…”  He grasped her fingers and brought them to his lips, pressing a kiss to the tough patch of skin where her dagger rested.  “I could have had that.  I don’t think it’s proud to say that…a dozen, more?  Ladies came to the Chantry, to coo and bat their eyes at me, ladies bred to be ornaments, to be simply adornments.  And those, too, who had been raised to be political wives, like Flora Harriman.  Especially once it came known I was heir. But before, too.  I could have had them without a lifting of my finger and not been unusual among the Chantry for my dallying. “  She was looking out of the window, filtered light hitting the line of her not-quite snubbed nose and her sharp little chin and he had to wonder that she could ever think that he’d want anyone else.  “But it was only ever you who woke me.  Only ever you who made me think that I might not be suited to the life as a brother.  Only ever you who made my heart race, who made me care.  I might have been encased in ice, all my days, pretending to love and not truly knowing anything of it, but for you.” 

“That doesn’t…”

“Aye it does.   I dinna want a political wife.  I want my wicked lass, my _rùn biodagain_.  I want you, and Starkhaven needs you to help rescue it.  I cannot do it on my own, no matter what the songs will say.  I need you there, with your knowledge of the backways and the dark parts of men’s hearts, so that I’m protected on my blindside.  I do not intend for you to hang up your daggers, _à ruin_.  Starkhaven has need of them.  The Maker sent you to me for that reason.”

“I fully intend to be there, but you cannot think that I can just stand at your side, as I am.”  His wicked smile surprised her, so rarely did she see it outside of their bedroom.

“I think exactly that.  Aeryn…do you think anyone thinks less of me when I stand beside you?  No, _leannan_.  What they think is…what is he, that he earned that right?  I have to earn their respect on my own, but…you, as you are, lend me high credit.  Men who would not, take notice of me.  And whether it’s right or not to use you as such…well, we shall see.  But I will take that advantage, Aeryn, just as you take advantage when people look at you and see only a small woman.   Do not doubt that, either.”

He was so earnest, Sebastian believed what he was saying and it was…stirring to hear him speak, so, but...  She snagged her lip in her teeth before she spoke, “Everything I did, when I tried to walk that line in Kirkwall, Sebastian, when they knew what I was…Everything fell apart.  And I’ll be damned if I let it happen again, to Starkhaven.”

His other hand squeezed her shoulder.  “That had nothing to do with you!”

Aeryn jerked away from him and stood to pace along the woven red carpet before turning to fix him with her piercing eyes.  “It didn’t help!  _Void_ …Do you remember?  The way they used to talk about me, when we were first together?”

Oh, aye, he remembered.  Sebastian recalled being so angry at one bunch of twittering fools that he’d wanted to pin them to the walls with arrows and call them out for their vile gossip.

Seeing the memory flash across his face, Aeryn nodded.  “Yes.  Did you ever stop to think that that was _after_?  After the Qunari, the Arishok.  After the dragons.   After all of it.  I _never_ earned their respect, Sebastian.”  He tried to interrupt her but she whirled and began pacing again, the train of the silken dress curling around her feet like seafoam. 

“It never mattered to me.  But imagine, please what it was like at first?  Fresh out of the mercenaries, blood not even dried on the coin I used to buy the estate and attending Mother’s salons and teas?  Her dinners?  Accompanying her to all the hundreds of foolish pursuits that nobles can think up to divert their attentions to the wretchedness around them.  And no matter how many lessons Fenris gave me on wine or the inside tips that Varric and Isabela and even Aveline, Maker help me, handed over, no matter how much I learned, how finely I tuned my manners, it _never mattered_.  But I had to keep trying, making up for the fact that I was the only child Mother had left, though I was least suited to it.  Then Mother died and I finally gave up and let them think what they would and to be quite honest with you, took a fair amount of pleasure in the flashes of fear in their eyes when I bothered to attend their little events.” 

She stopped, quite suddenly, the line of her back and shoulders rigid and one fist braced against the stone.  “If they had trusted me…I might have tried to pull a little more influence, maybe even tried for Viscount.  At the very least, I would have been a better balance to Meredith.  I could have...I will _not_ let it happen again, Sebastian.  Not if I can stop it by smiling and dressing the part and keeping my sharps hidden until I need them.”  _Make him see.  Please.  Don’t let me ruin this for him_.  Aeryn wasn’t sure who she thought she was praying to, though.

Sebastian held his breath a moment.  He’d always been amazed at how well she dealt with the noble circles.  How easily all of the little niceties came to her and had just put it up to Leandra Hawke’s early training.  But he’d never thought, there were so many things that Leandra wouldn’t have bothered with, when her children were simply farmer’s children, fugitives.  And then she’d come straight to it, after all of the things she’d done as Meeran’s assassin.  After the Deep Roads and the hard things she’d still never spoken of that haunted her.  All those things hidden away to save face and make life easier for her mother.

He glanced down at his hands, certainly not the hands of a prince.  “I’m sorry, I never thought.  I suppose I just assumed all of those things came naturally for you.  Foolish.  No wonder you didn’t think to ask me if I wanted you to…hide yourself.”

Pushing up from the settee, he strode over to her and laid his hand on her nape, softly, trying to ease the knots away.  “I know that doubt, you know, _mo chridhe._   D’you feel that?”  He brushed the hard edges of his own calluses against her and felt her shiver beneath his touch.  “They aren’t the hands of a prince.  I’ve shed blood, others and my own, to earn those calluses.  I’ve done the scrubwork of a lay brother and spent my nights on my knees and none of that is how my father spent his time and despite his lip service, he would never have respected it.  But I must be a prince and so I must believe that the man I am, who I have become through my service and my time with you, is who the Maker wants.  And it’s my duty to make all of Starkhaven believe it as well.”

His voice was low and when Aeryn turned to look at him, his eyes blazed. 

“Starkhaven isn’t Kirkwall.  Kirkwall was _doomed_ , Aeryn.  Too much rode against you.  It’s not so in Starkhaven.  And…if you made mistakes, trusted where you shouldn’t have…Maker.  Are you not allowed to be human?  You cannot claim divinity, _mo chridhe_ , for all that I do adore you.” Sebastian pulled back slightly.  “I want the nobles of Starkhaven to understand that if they accept me, they take you as well.  I know that it's on me, Aeryn. These decisions. But I need you there, now. They need to know you, beyond merely your reputation.”  His hand ran along her strong shoulder and the taut arm to her scarred little hand and he turned it over in his to kiss her rough palm.  “They need to see you _as you are_. Cleve and Robard will attend Dierdre's Satinalia before heading back to the Marches for First Day and we mean to have a brief meeting between supper and the ball. I will lay out my plan and I do not feel they believe it will succeed. I need you there,  _rùn biodagain._ "

Sebastian only ever called her that when he meant to bring up her skillset. He wanted her, both sides of her in the room with him, then. And it was so flaming hard to not at least try to give him what he wanted.  Pulling away from him, Aeryn stretched her shoulders and flexed her hands, trying to burn away some of the tension and feeling the tight, neat silk confining her, constricting.

Years of this?  Could she manage years of it or was he right?  Would they respect him more, as a prince if his wife could run both sides?  More to the point, could she protect him better if she didn’t hide than if she did?  _Well, I couldn’t defend him dressed like this, I’d split every seam in this blasted bodice trying to get a blade angled right._  

So, could she do that? Could she be his lady and his mercenary and blend her two selves in a way acceptable to other nobles, something she had never truly managed in Kirkwall? Better to find out now, Aeryn supposed, than to wait until it was too late. And easier, too, than maintaining the full mask. 

Sebastian watched her, but whatever she was thinking was locked down so tightly her face might have been carved of marble.  It took all his control not to speak again, to not try again to make her see.

Finally, she nodded slowly.

"Alright, Sebastian. I don't...I don't know if this is the best thing. But, it's your call.  I…I can try to walk the line again."

"Thank you. It will be fine, _leannan_. I know it." Thankful, he tipped her chin up to kiss her and had to beat back a lash of desire that crossed him when she curled her hot little tongue into his mouth, stroking.  Middle of the day and she had said she’d somewhere to be.  With a sigh, he broke the kiss. “Now, you had an appointment?”

“Fenris and I were going to spar a bit.”  Aeryn  arched her eyebrow at him.  Had he meant it?  “You mean it…you want them all to see me for what I am?”

Oh, dear.  “Aye.”  And it took all his skill not to sound hesitant.

“Alright, then.  I’d best change.”  Aeryn rose before recalling, “Oh, Sebastian.  Your brother…?”

Sebastian shrugged.  “I dinna know whether to believe it.  I would like to.  Gant has no reason to lie, I think.  It would be more to his advantage if I thought that Lucas, as heir to all I want to claim, held me in contempt.  I just wish…”  Too late.  Far too late.  But still. 

Aeryn brushed her thumb across his cheekbone, waiting for him to look up, and gazed into the crystal blue.  Void, how could anyone look at this man and not believe in him and his honor?  “Believe it.  He’s a good liar, but not that good.  He was glad to see you step up.”

Aeryn beat him as usual, ready and out of the door to tag Fenris before he’d gotten his boots on.  He followed them to the courtyard and made for the gallery overlook, above the noise of those who had gathered to watch.  Normally he’d leave them to it, but something gleaming in her eye…worried was the wrong word. 

The afternoon had gone as crisp and sweet as one of the apples that Fenris and Aeryn were so fond of by the time he reached the gallery.

The on-looking crowd noise drifted up to him from the grounds, as well, placing bets on their favorite and cat-calling as the combatants took each other’s measure. "There's no way. Look at her, she's just a rogue. That elf will have her for a snack and look for more. Have you seen the size of that sodding sword he totes?”

They had three types of these spars, Aeryn and Fenris. There was the warm up, just keeping on each other’s toes. There was the established fight to three taps. And then there was what Isabela referred to as their "balls to the wall" scraps, where Aeryn and Fenris did their level best to kill one another and only time or dangerous, ‘really we need a healer’, injury stopped them.

To match the three styles, there were only three rules to these spars. Fenris could not use his tattoos, Aeryn couldn't call up her shadows, and neither of them was allowed any weapon beyond their bodies.  That didn’t make either of them any less dangerous.

As he watched Aeryn duck under Fenris' whipcord strong arm and smash one of her boots towards his privates with a vicious little sneer, Sebastian realized that was the show they meant to put on today.  Despite the fight with slavers and a bloodmage hunt a few days before, the two partners were clearly feeling the need for a bit of a stretch.  And he’d had to go and ask her to show the nobles what she was made of. 

Blood and fire, mostly, it seemed from the look of her. It wasn’t false.  _Ah, holy Andraste preserve them, then._

Aeryn rolled with his backhand across her face, look of her now.  It came up spitting blood as she grabbed Fenris’ gauntlet, twisted, heaved, and flipped him over her hip. Fenris barely missed her booted foot to his hand by rolling away to yank at her thigh and pull her down. Aeryn went to her knees but caught the elf on either side of his head with the flat of her hands.

The cat-calling had stopped.

As the fight ranged out of the circle and across the yard, it was entirely brutal. Neither of them failed to hit a weak point. Fenris had a gash across the bridge of his nose and the blood streaming made him look frighteningly savage. Aeryn's grin was laced with a similar bloody hue and there was a bright smear across her nose where she’d wiped her eyes.

Around and about they went.

Fenris at one point lifted Aeryn bodily and smacked her shoulders twice against the bricks in jarring succession and it was only the fact that he knew better, having once interrupted them in his early days following Aeryn, that kept him from calling time.  Sebastian knew he'd be snarled at. "Do I look like I need rescuing, Choir Boy?" had been her taunting remark after she'd tackled him, borne him over, thrust her feet into his gut and sent him skidding halfway across her garden before turning back to her play with Fenris. Sebastian had rubbed his sore pride and stayed to watch, hoping to gain a few pointers.  School indeed.  After they’d finished, they’d turned on him and sent him through a series of throws and kicks that had required a dose of healing potion before he’d been fit to walk back to the Chantry.

Now, they were _both_ smiling like fiends. And twice they started laughing, which disconcerted their viewers. There were flecks of blood speckling the trampled snow around the circle. Aeryn got in another stunning blow to Fenris' ears and flipped him into a snow pile and then picked up a handful and washed his face with it. Fenris wrenched her arm, and tossed her across the ring.  She rolled in a tumbling move, but Fenris was back on her, pinning her, and dropped a scoop into the neck of Aeryn’s leathers making her shriek before she flipped him off. It was a bit like watching a particularly pretty pair of dragonets tussle and just like that, with her bright laughter and his deep chuckle, the fight was over. They lay on the frozen ground for a moment breathing hard before Aeryn flipped up to her feet and pulled Fenris to his. The crowd was silent before they realized the match was over and set to deciding who won.

Aeryn spied Sebastian watching and sketched him a bow, and blew him a slightly bloody kiss before the two sauntered off to the kitchen to wheedle an early tea from the cook, always ravenous after a proper spar.  Weaving a little, but for all the world as if they both didn't look like they'd been on the losing end of a fight with demons.  He shook his head, fondly and only slightly exasperated.  He’d have an excuse to give her a good going over, at least. 

"Are they all right? Should I send the healer to check on them?" Alistair had trod up behind him to see the last few minutes of the fight and was peering over the balcony to the bloody snow below and several of the off-duty guards and a handful of knights trying out some of the moves they’d seen.

"No. They're tossing back potions as we speak.  Believe it or not, they were having fun."  It was a rueful chuckle.

“Is something the matter?  They don't usually fight like…that, do they?”  Sebastian shrugged and Alistair shook his head, wonderingly.  “I admit, it would upset me to see another treat my beloved so…"  He shrugged.  “Lyna and Zevran used to spar and I fought with her, too, but… That was a little harsh.”

"Aeryn and Fenris have been sparring for years. They know their limits and those limits exceed what others would consider normal.  Seven years of it, with never longer than a week to rest, generally.  She was almost always fighting, since the night at Ostagar.  Her boat trips to the Marches and back again are the only real downtime she’s ever had.  It took, a special sort of endurance.”  Sebastian made no effort to hide the admiration he had for his lover.  “She told me once, better to test the edges with Fenris, who would move mountains to see her properly healed than to risk a sudden opponent who was less considerate.  And also, I think it was a trust builder between them, when they first met.  But, yes, it bothers me a bit.  I know better than to call halt though, when she needs to blow off steam."

Sebastian felt a little unnerved as the warden-king assessed him, but he stood his ground. 

Alistair spoke after a moment.  "I upbraided your Hawke a bit.  And I guess you worked it out, since she didn’t seem to mind Gant and the other ambassadors seeing that scrap.  But…she's not wrong, Sebastian. If you mean to rule, it's you they need to look to and...she's a forceful personality. Until they can rely on you, it’s better if the nobles of Starkhaven see her only as your support."

"I won’t have her be other than she is.  Unless she wants it, and I’ve seen no sign that she’s ready to lay down her daggers and her lockpicks.  She’s capable of both.  She can do it.  She’s just hesitating because of the mess Kirkwall was.  She blames herself and I won’t have it." Sebastian spoke firmly, and Alistair’s scowl opened up in a look of understanding.

"I had no intention of being king, you know."

"Really?" It was an abrupt shift, but Sebastian allowed Alistair to redirect them as they strode down the hall.

"It was...mostly Eamon's idea. I was a bastard. When I realized who my father was, they took pains to make it very clear that I had no claim and would never be a prince of Ferelden. But then I was the only thing remotely resembling a Theirin left. And then Lyna...she hoped I could make things better. For the elves and the mages, and so doing, make Ferelden stronger. I don't know that if she'd lived...they looked to her. If she hadn't died, if she hadn't forced my hand to make my own way...it would have been harder to do that.  She told me...she would leave me. “  The king stopped at one of the windows overlooking the rose garden. 

“I'm doing well by her trust. But if she'd lived...she'd have had to leave me anyway, because that was the only way for me to be king in my own right. Don't force Hawke, Sebastian. She's got a good eye for pitfalls, I think. She'll not put her foot quite that wrong, again. You don't have exactly the same obstacles that Lyna and I had. Once they accept your lead, she'll be able to find a clearer place. But it has to be you. Or else, you are not the leader your city needs."

Sebastian looked out over the snowy garden.   The shadow of the rowan tree had kept snow off the rose bushes just around it, still with a few defiant blooms.  “I thank you for the advice, Alistair.  I’ll not forget it.”

Alistair clapped him on the shoulder with a broad hand and Sebastian thought it was probably only pride that kept him upright against the blow.  No posing king, this.  “Good man.”  He glanced down at the garden again and then turned back to his study.

Fenris and Aeryn managed to beg a tray of bread and cheese, cider for her and wine for him from the cook, who disapproved of inbetween meals for everyone except her beloved king, who needed such things, being a Warden and all.

Sitting just off the warm kitchen, in a small storeroom where the servants often ate, the two of them scarfed down the snack, between sips of healing potion.

“You’ve decided against drifting through the castle like a lady, when the politicians are around, then?”  There was something almost happy in Fenris’ deep tones and Aeryn glanced up from her bread.

“Was I truly being that unsubtle?”  He gave her a dark look.  “Oh, Maker, you’re supposed to bash me around when I get stupid, Fenris.” 

“I was attempting to not interfere.  I…did not want to intrude.” 

Uh oh.  “Fenris, you’re my best friend.  How exactly would you keeping me on the straight and narrow qualify as intrusion?”

He fussed with the edge of the glass tumbler.  “I…you aren’t only my friend, Hawke.  You’re Sebastian’s…woman?  What are you, not his betrothed yet, I assume?”

“No, that comes later.  But…I’ll always be your friend, you know, no matter what I am to Sebastian.”  Her low voice was earnest and it went some way to smoothing the slight ruffle to his temper.

“You can’t say it isn’t different, though.”

“We’ve been a bit wrapped up in each other, haven’t we?”  She nudged his shoulder and he rolled his eyes and nudged back. “I’m sorry if I’ve missed anything important.”

“No.  Well…Isabela and I are no longer…”  He shrugged, “Whatever it was we were.”

She leaned back into him.  “And is that…?  Help me out, Fenris.  Shall I go and slice her sails into bits?  Or should I punch you again on her account?  Steal your wine?”  She snagged his cup away and he had to smile at the mischief on her face.

With his cup safe again, he shook his head.  “It’s all right, Hawke.  We agreed it was time.  We have been good for one another, but it is time to part before that changes.  Neither one of us is suited to the sort of life the other wishes to pursue.”

“Isabela to her seas and you to fight with us and help us reclaim Starkhaven.”  He nodded and finished off his wine.  “And…” Aeryn paused, but he had helped her with Sebastian so she asked while rolling the last of the bread into tiny balls.  “I hope you mean to find someone…someone who is more suited to the life you want.”

“I…also wish that.”

She smiled at him, one of her brilliant grins.  “I get yay or nay, though, right?”

“Yes, brat, I imagine it would be hard to deter you.”  Especially considering…but Fenris wasn’t quite sure in his own head where that thought led.  “Not that I recall you asking me about Sebastian, early on.”  He smirked around his bite of bread.

“If I thought you’d had an objection, I’d have reconsidered.”  Aeryn was grave and touched his hand.  “I…it was important to me that you liked him.  You seemed to.”

Fenris nodded, and pushed his trencher away.  “He’s a good man.  I wondered at times about his commitment to you…but, I have seen the depths of that, since.  You are both fortunate.  I hope I am…half as lucky.” 

Letting her eyes sparkle at him, Aeryn couldn’t resist a little tease as they tidied up their meal.  “You just wait, my lad.   I’ll have them lined up for you.”

“ _Venhedis_ , Hawke…do not make me tell Sebastian to beat you.” 

She sniffed, “Him and what army?”

“I would help, you realize.  But it is ill manners to beat a man’s woman without his permission.”

“OH!”  One of the serving maids had come in and caught the last words before scurrying back out of the room.

Hawke wore a wicked grin as she pulled him to her feet.  “Well, that will start some rumors.  C’mon.  I need Sebastian to help me daub elfroot…”  Fenris’ fingers on her lips stopped her.

“I do not need to know that.”  Her eyes were laughing and he smiled at her, fully.  It was good to see Hawke like this.  With any luck, someday it would be the rule. 

Bethany’s couldn’t help a cry of dismay as she saw the two of them coming up the stairs.  The healing potion had done away with much of the heavier injuries, one slightly cracked rib on Fenris’ part and a hairline break to one of Aeryn’s little fingers, but there were cuts and bruises still lingering on the pair when they got to the sitting room that the companions shared. 

“What in the Maker’s Name happened to you?  Were you in a tavern brawl?”

Aeryn grinned, and then paused as she wiggled a tooth.  _Ah, better take another dose_.  “We’re fine.  We were just having a bit of practice.”

“With what?  An ogre?”  Oh, blast.  Bethany saw Aeryn’s face shut down, though her sister’s smile didn’t slip a bit. 

Fenris stepped between him as if he’d had some practice deflecting for his partner.  “Bethany, may I ask…I don’t think the potion has healed my ribs entirely.  Could you…?” 

And she was so surprised to have Fenris ask for her help, that Bethany missed it when Aeryn slipped into her own rooms, until the door shut firmly. 

“OH!  Come on, then.  Though I should let you suffer if you did this on purpose.”  Fenris followed her to the small still room she’d improvised, with a sheepish expression.

Sebastian followed her not long after, as Aeryn, bare to the waist, but for her breast band, was trying to reach a gash on the back of her shoulder where Fenris’ gauntlet had found a weak point in the leather. 

“Let me, then.”  He scooped up a glob of the salve and smeared it liberally across the raw skin, making her hiss and then relax as the numbing coolness set in.  “Better?” 

“Almost.”  There was a hint of invitation in her tone and Sebastian followed up with a brush of his lips.  “Now it’s all fixed up.”  She settled against him, shifting her hips back into the cradle of his and leaning her head back against his shoulder with a hum.

She smelled of salt and sweat.  Tinged with a bite of steel, as if it her daggers were a part of her.  He recalled that she’d claimed to love the way he smelled after he’d come in from target shooting.  There was…yes, he thought he might understand.  He wanted to have her spread out for him, the desire to chase that biting scent across her ivory skin thrumming.  His lips parted and he traced the blue vein in  her neck with the tip of his tongue, blood still rushing through it, hot under the silken flesh. 

“Oh, I was going to …”

“No.”  Sebastian bit lightly at the edge of her ear as his large hands closed on her bare shoulders and Aeryn shuddered against him, as if he’d sent a shock through her nerves.  “Mine.”

“Is that so?” 

“Oh, aye.  You need a reminder, _mo chridhe_.” 

Her hands shifted to the laces of her trousers even as she protested lightly.  “Reminder of what, exactly?”

The leather was stuck to her with snowmelt and sweat, but he shoved them past her hips as Aeryn turned to face him, catching her against his chest when she stumbled.  Sebastian’s voice had gone deep in his chest and she felt it rumbling beneath her hands. “You need reminding that I dinna want some soft, sweet girl.  I want _you_. I want my Aeryn who can cut a throat and pick a pocket and then turn around and make me beg for need of her and make me weep with the depth of her heart.“

He had the catch of her breastband undone and she was bare against him, but his own buttons and laces didn’t last long against her clever fingers and it was nearly a crow of triumph that burst from her throat when Sebastian was naked in her hands, his need sending her frantic to have him, the throb between her thighs as insistent as his hands on her arse. 

Falling back into the armchair, he pulled her along with him to straddle him, and she sank down on his cock with a smile that curled down his spine, their eyes locked.

Aeryn let her fingers wander, down the broad expanse of his chest to dally at his nipples, twisting a little.  His eyes went dark and intense and he twitched up, suddenly, making her grab the shifting muscle of his shoulders for balance.

“You w..were saying?”  She rode him fast and shallow at first, her knees pressed hard against the leather seat but there was an avid interest in her face even as he thrust to meet her.  Hard and hot as worked silverite, he moaned as she twisted her hips, sliding deeper, and she gasped at the feel of him.  Luxury, pure and simple, the only sort she’d ever craved, his touch and his voice.  His hard, skilled hands, his mouth trailing fire on her body and the velvet sound of his praise for her murmurs of delight.

Sebastian whispered as they moved slower to spin out the sensation.  “Oh, that’s my lass.  My wicked _rùn biodagain_.  I want the whole of you down to the sharp, dark heart of you.”  One hand left her hips to massage her breast, to tug the taut nipple to his mouth and the flat of his tongue, still tasting the trace of steel, the humid scent of her filling his nostrils and he didn’t bother to resist the need to breathe her in. 

She leaned back, trusting him to hold her and on the next thrust, he hit the mark, sending a spasm of bright pleasure along her nerves.  Another and Aeryn shut her eyes against the coiled whip of satisfaction that seemed sure to split her in pieces.

She shuddered around him, the low keen of her voice like a caress and Sebastian couldn’t help his savage smile of joy as she broke for him.   In a wave, the need to come made his thrusts run faster as her fingers clutched in his hair and her sheath tightened around him, clenching, his growl muffled by her mouth hard and hot on his.

They trembled a little as they rested.  His cock was still buried in the warmth of her sheath.  Aeryn’s forehead, pressed against his shoulder was damp with sweat, her red hair dark with it and Sebastian reached down and pulled his tunic over her back to keep the chill off before he wrapped his arms back around her.

“But for all the troubles we’ve heard of, _à ruin_ , I’d let you stay here.  I’d find a place here, in Ferelden, and let you have your home.”

Blood was still rushing in her ears and Aeryn wasn’t sure she’d heard him correctly.  “Hmmm?” was the only query she could manage just then, though.

Sebastian swallowed hard.  “I want to make you a home, Aeryn.  But if you’ve chosen Ferelden…”

“I haven’t…What are you talking about?”  She focused finally on his meaning.

“The other day, when you came back from looking for Macie…you called this your home and I…”  It was hard not to sound childish.  “I wish we could stay, here where you’ve been so happy.” I shouldn’t have even brought it up.  Now she’ll think I resent it.

Aeryn pushed herself up to look at him and caught the sheepish dismay.  “You think I meant…” waving her hand, “this.  Ferelden?” 

“Well, yes?”

And how was he to know, Aeryn?  Did you ever explain to him what home meant to you?  “Sebastian.  Oh, my own, I didn’t mean Ferelden.  I meant…home for me isn’t a place, you know.  We moved so much when I was little.  Home for me was where my family was, where my heart was.  Where I was safe.  I didn’t mean Ferelden, my love.  I meant…”  she slid her arms back around his shoulders and pressed her forehead to his.  “This.  Here.  You and what we have.  Did you not know?”

“Well, I do now.”  Blessings every single word out of her mouth.  Holy Andraste, what did I ever do to prove worthy of this woman?

The dimple flashed in her cheek as she shook her head and kissed the end of his nose.  “Daft man.”

 

 

 

 

 


	17. Chapter 17

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's Notes: Okay, dear readers, I'm back in business mode on this story after a hiatus due to another project. Consider this a small interlude before a larger, more action packed chapter to set our gang off to Starkhaven. Thank you so much for your patience

Aeryn had awakened, sitting abruptly up, staring and shaking in the dark, barely able to speak.  Sebastian had tried to offer comfort, tried to get her to talk but she’d just risen from the bed and stalked over to the fireplace.  He stared into that fireplace, a thick log glowing from the flames licking along its form and recalled.

“Aeryn…”  Sebastian watched her jabbing the crumbling logs into embers with short, vicious stabs. 

Thoughts in tumult and wanting to tell him, Aeryn was incapable of being still.  She finally gave into the adrenaline pushing her and tugged her clothes on, strapped her daggers into place, pacing. 

"I don't know, I don't.  Stop asking."  Sebastian came up behind her but she pushed his hands away when he started to speak again. 

Grey eyes bright and her cheeks heavily flushed, as though she'd taken a fever. Her own quick hands finding knives to slip into their hidden sheaths before she stalked into the darkened hall. 

It took all his control, but Sebastian did as she asked.  Just followed her down to the practice yard to watch over her, and while she threw her blades into targets, he contemplated her motion and prayed.  Over and over.  Silently.  The rhythm of Aeryn’s practice and the occasional heavy breath of her exertion, the only sounds in the echoing space. 

One of the guards stopped by to check on them, pausing in his rounds to watch Hawke work and to warm his hands over the brazier in the corner of the walled space. 

"We haven't disturbed anyone?"  Sebastian asked, suddenly realizing the royal chambers were close by. 

"Nah.  Walls are thick.  She's not the only one in this palace who can't sleep of a night." Aeryn’s movements came smooth and fast and only the silence, her blank face and the near obsessive repetitiveness betrayed her disquiet.  "She alright?"

"I think so.  It's rarely this bad."  In his worry, Sebastian was less cautious of Aeryn's privacy.  Perhaps he should have gone to find Fenris.

"Happens to the best of us, m'lord.  And...if I'm not overstepping?"  The guard had pushed back his visor and glanced at Sebastian, who shook his head.  "Well, you don't get that good at killing without some pretty black need.  The king...well, he's a one, as well.   Don't make 'em bad nor any more broken than the rest of us.  Just, they need watching."

The man moved on then and in a few minutes Aeryn had pulled her knives from the target and then stood for just a minute, gazing up at the sky.  It had cleared sometime earlier in the evening, the heavy pall of clouds gone, and now the temperature was plunging and every star the night sky had to offer was etched in silverite on the ebony field.

Wet with sweat, she was shivering and Sebastian took the chance to move up behind her, to shield her from the bite of wind swirling down into the practice yard.  “Better now?”

“Yes.  Sorry.”  Aeryn clipped out the words even as she turned and she couldn’t quite meet his eye.  She paused, expecting him to start up with his questions again and it startled her when he just gave her a sweet smile and tucked her against his own warmth.

They walked back, padding up the stairs quietly, the heat of her exercise rolling off of her skin and a slight tremor running through her.

Sebastian didn’t want to feel as though Aeryn should be obligated to tell him what she dreamed, what drove her from their bed.  He did his best to force back his questions and his, he hoped, innocent desire to help her, as she’d helped him once, when his dreams had caused him such grief.  Was it arrogance, some desire to control her that made him want to know what shattered her sleep so?  He didn’t think so, but lack of surety kept him silent.

He managed well enough that he was able to just let her go when she tugged away from him to duck into her dressing room.  He’d taken advantage of his, as well, only to come back to find her slouching as gracelessly as he’d ever seen her, outlined against the moonlight streaming in the window, her hair wet.  Sebastian sat down on the soft mattress, the creak of the ropes holding it taut loud in the still room and ran his hands through his hair, trying to decide what to do. 

Hearing him come in, Aeryn turned and stood just shy of his knees, anxiety betrayed in the way she bit her lip and looked up at him through her lashes.

“I’m afraid to tell you.  I’m afraid that…”

Maker, she sent his heart shaking.  “You don’t have to.  But it helps, _mo chridhe,_ to lance it.”

She took a ragged breath and spoke softly, hands clenching and releasing as if she could fling out her wretched nightmare through the tips of her fingers like a dangerous spell.  “Everyone’s dead.  All around me in the fog.  Everyone.  Just...and blood everywhere.  It’s always like that.  I can smell the dirt and the iron and the blood clotting on my skin. And then, sometimes I’m hunting for what did it.  And sometimes I realize it’s me.  I’m the one who’s killed you all.”  She tensed, watching his face and waiting for him to rebuke her.

Sebastian had no intention of that.  The revelation almost didn’t surprise him, even as a spurt of useless anger stabbed through him.  He could do nothing about what led Aeryn to her dreams, he reminded himself.  All he could do was meet her where she stood.  “It’s a dream, _à ruin_.  A hard one.  And borne of your past, but I know you.  You’d flay yourself before you’d hurt one of us.”  He’d knelt up on the bed, then to reach out and run his fingers into her damp hair, felt it clinging to his fingers as he rubbed the bone behind her ear.  Aeryn straightened and gazed at him, her chin firm and her eyes nearly colorless rings around blackly blown pupils. 

“The worst ones are the ones where I enjoy it so much, I hope it never ends.”  As if she were daring him to continue his gentle consolation.

 _Maker._   He took her hand in his, palm up, and traced the disparate sizes as she had done before, across the sea in another bed.  “I do not believe you would.”

Aeryn recalled as well, but she had to chide him.  ““It’s not the same, love.  You were having dreams that you would never act on, influenced by a demon.  I’ve _done_ such things.  I’ve hurt people, killed and taken pleasure in it, satisfaction.  And you know it.”

He fixed her gaze and drew her closer, enclosing her hand in between his.  “I do.  I know you _did_.  But that is not who you are _now_ , Aeryn.  Nor do I believe you would ever let yourself become so again.”

“Am I so strong, then?”

“Wiser.  Not so lost.” He tugged her hand to his chest and set his other hand to cup her cheek, “I love you, _mo chridhe_.  And your dreams do not frighten me.  I’ve seen your heart, Aeryn Hawke.”  Sitting there in the near dark, he traced the fine arch of her brow, defiant against his words and saw the moment she gave into the comfort of it. 

She couldn’t help but close her eyes and lean into his touch, finally.  “You’re always so fearless.  How…”

“No, I’ve fears enough.  I’m simply faithful and you have earned my faith and more.  Come to bed.”  And as she’d settled herself against him again, Sebastian had smoothed out his own breath, listened to the bells of the Chantry ringing Lauds in the clear, sharp air, and prayed for light in the darkness.

\---000---

 

 

At Varric’s the night before the festival of Satinalia began, Aeryn watched the barmaids hanging up a bit of greenery and the pearly glass globes that represented the moon the festival was named for.  In other places, Satinalia would be celebrated as Andraste’s birthday, but here in the bar they were happily devoted to the more…ah, carnal appetites the midwinter party would stoke.  That and the growing length of the nights.   Brothels always did a hearty business on Satinalia.

 

Sebastian was playing a hand of Wicked Grace with Fenris as Merrill listened to Varric tell Bethany about how they’d once tracked a party of Tal Vashoth across the Wounded Coast on the third Satinalia Hawke had been in Kirkwall.  The kossith had been drinking around their fire, of all things.  Invited them to drink to the moon and she’d heard her first Qunari poetry, when they’d been fully in their cups and melancholy with it.  It had been a strange evening, no doubt. 

Aeryn and the others had spent the afternoon gathering up the finery they’d wear to the Satinalia ball and her feet were sore from the back and forth walking and standing while the seamstress worked.  She’d had to completely rework her dress.   Plus, shopping with Isabela was always a workout.   Not that it slowed the pirate down, any.  Aeryn grinned to herself, watching her tease and lure the lucky lad at the bar whose curling black hair and bright eyes had caught Isabela’s attention.  Switching her position, Aeryn  swung her legs up on the bench and set them in Sebastian’s lap while she leaned against Varric’s shoulder.  Sebastian absently rubbed her toes through the soft doeskin boots, a recent indulgence, and she closed her eyes, soothed by Varric’s rumbling voice and Sebastian’s ministrations. 

The fire was warm and the company safe and she’d had rather more to drink than she would normally, Varric having found a source of Starkhaven whiskey and wanting Sebastian’s opinions on whether or not it was authentic.  “You’ve got the nose for it, Choir Boy.”  And the hard head apparently, Sebastian was as steady after the fifth as he’d been before the first.

“Old habits apparently die hard.” Sebastian had grinned a little sheepishly when Varric had arched his eyebrow and quipped about needing to edit some of his stories about the Choir Boy.  

Aeryn was half asleep when a movement in the doorway caught her eye.  A dark head and a small, lithe frame.  She scrambled up and nearly knocked the bench over as she tried to catch up with Macie,  almost getting a hand on the girl when a crowd of early revelers stumbled between them.  Aeryn pushed through the drunks, but Macie had slipped away already.  The door was open, wind whipping in, causing the patrons to complain loudly.

Aeryn completely lost her in the blowing snow outside the tavern.  The melted snow around the building had soaked through the delicate suede boots, silly useless things, but she ignored it as she trotted down the street and checked the alley.  The snow was too trampled to find the light steps of the scamp among the prints on the cobbles. 

Sodding Void.  Aeryn rubbed her forehead before turning back. Bethany was in the doorway, holding out her cloak.  “Thought I saw Macie.”  Aeryn explained.

“You did.”  Bethany cast a subtle warming spell to dry Aeryn’s boots and Aeryn wiggled her toes in the warmth before following Bethany back to their table.

Sebastian had a little bundle unwrapped before him and a frown on his face as he contemplated the small, simple Feastday gifts.  Turkey feathers of the sort that Sebastian liked for his simpler arrows.  A tiny handmade book of Ferelden songs for Varric, written in Macie’s shaky script.  A pretty shell for Isabela and a small rock with silver veining for Fenris.  Two cloth bags full of seeds of some sort for Bethany and Merrill.  And a tiny carved mabari for Aeryn. 

“Oh.”

“Aeryn, did you find her?”  She hated to see the wrinkle that betrayed Sebastian’s bewildered grief when she had to say no.  “Why would she just leave these?  If she wants nothing to do with us?  We can’t even give her something in return.”  He ran a thumb down a pinion, fanning the edge, a dark brooding tone in his voice.

“I’m sorry, love.  I’ll go look again, now that I’ve got my cloak.”  She pulled her hood up, but Sebastian caught her elbow. 

“Not what I meant, Aeryn.  I was just thinking aloud.  Do you think it’s her way of asking if she can come back?” 

Oh.  Well, now that was possible.  She had to nod.  “Could be. I guess she’s keeping an eye out for us, even if we haven’t seen her.”  With a sigh, Aeryn added.  “We should probably go.  Like to be a late night with the party and all.”

Sebastian kept his head up as they made their way back to the palace, but he saw no sign of their little shadow. 

\---000---

He had to admit to some impatience. 

Sebastian had been chased out of their rooms a couple of hours before dinner while Aeryn, Bethany, Merrill and Isabela had dressed.  He’d protested but, considering the formidable nature of the women of their company, had simply given in and taken his gear over to Fenris’ rooms.  The others had finally emerged not long after Varric arrived and after handing them his compliments and elbowing Fenris into making a few as well, he’d gone back to chivvy Aeryn, who was being unusually slow in her preparations.

“Aeryn, we have to go.”

“I’m almost ready.  Open your gift, why don’t you?  It’s there on the bedside.”

Sebastian blinked.   Knowing Aeryn’s unease with gift exchanges, he’d not expected her to give him anything.  There was a small rectangular package on the table and he picked it up, surprised at its weight.  He tugged on the ribbon that held the cloth wrappings closed.

And blinked.

It was a book, clearly meant for a royal library.  A written copy of the Chant of Light, but beautifully bound in rich, deep blue leather with the title and Andraste’s symbol embossed and stamped in silver.  It was sealed with a silverite clasp and when he sprung the catch, it opened to his hand. 

It _was_ the Chant.  But printed meticulously by some diligent scribe only on the left hand page.  On the right, the creamy, thick paper was blank.  He rang a finger over the nearly smooth page, wonderingly. 

“Do you like it?”  She called from the dressing room. 

“I…yes.  I’ve no’ seen such a thing before, but…it’s beautiful, Aeryn.  Thank you.” 

“I thought you might…I didn’t know how many of Elthina’s sermons survived.  I…you and she had a different way of looking at the Chant.  I thought you might remember something of her words.  That you might…transcribe them.  Or make notes, anyway.”

 _Well, there’s an idea_.  But thought fled him when Sebastian turned towards her to thank her properly.

Aeryn was leaning against the doorway and stepped to his outstretched hand with a shush of whispering velvet, so deep a red he thought it was black until it caught the glow of candlelight.

 It laced tightly up her sides, modestly cut in front, and she enjoyed the way his smile crept across his face at the sight.  Good enough so far, she thought, but what about the back.

Sebastian raised his brow as she seemed to shy away from him but she turned and he saw that the gown was cut low in back setting off her shoulders and revealing so much of her elegant, strong back that it seemed she only needed to shift to expose the dimples on either side of her spine, just at the curve of her arse. Glimpses of skin showed through the slashes in the sleeves, as well. 

"I've changed my mind. We're not going."

"Not going, why on..." Aeryn jerked her head around, concerned, but catching the avid gleam in his eye, her smile went sly. "Oh. Does it look nice?  The color suits me?" 

She ran her hands down her narrow waist, rendered even smaller by the structured corset, and over the curve of her arse.

 Sebastian felt his mouth go dry. 

" _Mo chridhe_ , that gown is designed to make a lover want to rip it off of you." _With my_ teeth _, Maker help me_.   Book set aside and forgotten, Sebastian crossed the room in two steps to her wondering how he'd ever get through the evening with Aeryn standing next to him in this.

Grinning wolfishly, Aeryn turned into him, laying a finger to his blue velvet waistcoat and running her finger up the fine nap of the fabric.  Sebastian looked like she’d poleaxed him, which was a lovely compliment, indeed. 

 "That may be true, darling man. But as you know that you're the only one whose clever fingers will ever be allowed anywhere near my buttons and hooks and laces, I'm not that concerned.  Could you help me?  With that last?" Up on her toes, she purred the last caressingly into his ear and he whirled her, pinning her front to the wall with a growl, pressing to her from behind with the length of his body. 

Sebastian couldn't resist a small taste, scraping his teeth lightly at the join of her neck and shoulders and slipping one hand under the fabric to seek out one of her dimples.

The delicious shiver his touch sent rippling through her sent Aeryn's head spinning.  He did _such_ things to her equilibrium.  But it did seem he liked this dress better than the last.  Well, then.  So did she.

She'd not quite finished lacing up the waist, Sebastian realized.  The gown would be more modest when it was done properly.  Not much, mind you, but enough to keep him from giving in halfway through the soup course and dragging her off to ravish her in an alcove.

"Wicked lass."  He sighed and then released her, letting his hands skim down to set the laces on her back just a little higher, removing one source of temptation, at least.

The dimple in her cheek flashed as she turned around, letting the velvet of her bodice brush temptingly against his chest and stretched up for a kiss, knowing she'd walk into the hall with her cheeks flushed, stars in her eyes and her lips plump and lush.  Better than any face paint. She couldn't help the laugh that bubbled up.

 Sebastian pulled back, surprised at the open, free sound of it. "What's funny?" 

"Not one thing.  You just make me happy."  Nimbly, she did up the elegant carved shell buttons that fastened his collar, finishing with a soft pat to his chest and fussily smoothing the neat pleating on his broad shoulders.

"Oh."  Between her words and her care, he was grinning like a besotted fool.  Which, Sebastian supposed, was accurate enough.  He bent to kiss her again, wanting to taste the laughter on her lips. 

After a moment, he murmured, “I’ve something for you as well, though…it will no’ go with your dress.”

His brogue had gone deeper and Aeryn’s hands reflexively began to stroke soothingly.  “You didn’t have to.”

“I wanted to, though.  I _want_ to give you things, _mo chridhe_.  Will you let me, then?” 

The blaze of his eyes was startlingly intense against the deep brown of his newly styled cut away coat.  It was a look that suited him, as Aeryn had thought it might when she’d conspired with the tailor.  “Keep looking at me like that, Sebastian, and you’ve my permission to do whatever you like.” 

His fingers tightened on her waist and he purred into her ear.  “I’m keeping a list of your teasing, you know.  I’ll have my revenge later.”  But he sat her aside, with some exercise of willpower, and pulled the small leather case from his trunk to set in her hands and then sat back to watch her open it, doing his best not to bounce, nervously.

Aeryn’s deft fingers had the case open in a trice.  She paused though, when she opened the trinket, completely surprised.  Against a white velvet cushion lay little golden hairpins, each capped with small violets, the petals carved from pale purple shell by some craftsman’s skilled hand. 

“ _Sebastian_.  Where did you find something so lovely?”  Hesitant, she touched the fragile curve of one violet with a newly buffed nail. 

Huskily, he answered.  “Ah, a man must have some secrets.  How am I to keep surprising you if I give them away?”  He watched her finger run down the golden pin.  “D’you like it, so?”

She looked up at him, bewildered at the idea that she might not like them.  “They’re beautiful.  You’re right, they won’t go with the dress.  I’ve…I can change.  I’ve a black…”

“No.  No, wear them another time.  I just…You’re sure you like them?”   She was biting her lip as though she was worried about something and he brushed his thumb across the plumped skin.

She had to blink fast, surprised at the tingly burn in her throat.  Something foolish and whimsical.  And no need to turn these into coin to run the clinic or stash away for some cause.  Leave it to Sebastian to find something she couldn’t bear to laugh off as too fanciful or impractical.

 “Yes, of course.  I just…I don’t…No one’s ever given me anything like this, you know?  Just pretty and decorative.  I always seem to bring out the _practical_ in everyone.” Aeryn’s lips had twisted wryly but her eyes had gone starry as the sky over the Waking Sea as she gazed up at him.

And Sebastian had to tamp down the possessive streak that unfurled in his heart that he could be first at something for her, something his alone.  He wanted to slide his fingers into the dark red hair, feel the silky strands catch on the rough patches of his fingers, but Sebastian doubted Aeryn would appreciate the disarrangement of her hair just at the moment, as it was pulled back elegantly from her face in a manner that spoke of her maid’s diligence.  _Beloved Andraste, forgive my intemperance_.  “I…just…they’ll last a bit longer than real flowers, I thought.  So long as you dinna use them for lockpicks.”  He gave her a wicked little smile and was pleased to see her answer in kind. 

“No, no I wouldn’t.  So they are practical, then.  Replacing the flowers, I mean,” Aeryn added when he hummed curiously.

“Ah, no.”  He slipped his fingers under her chin to stroke the soft skin they found there.  “I’ll find you flowers, too, _à ruin_ , come the spring.  We’ll find violets in Starkhaven.”  And if there were none to be found, then he’d plant them himself.  She stretched up again for his kiss and for five minutes they forgot balls and presents and….ah, knocks on the door.

 


	18. Chapter 18

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Author's Notes: Beginning right where the last chapter left off. Thanks, as always, to mille libri for her excellent (and in this case above and beyond) beta. And, thanks to you, dear readers, for being supportive and wonderful! Bioware owns all, I'm just happy to play in the sandbox! Inspiration for Sebastian, Aeryn's and Isabela's Satinalia attire from the "Till We Sleep" storyline of Dark Horse's Dragon Age Comics._

Aeryn answered Bethany’s impatient knock, with a smirk on her lips.  Her sister was clearly more excited than she cared to let on about the Satinalia festivities. 

Then again, Aeryn had to admit it was the first formal sort of event Bethany had been allowed to attend, except for the aberration of her trip to Orlais.  The baby sister Aeryn remembered had once dreamed of such things and Aeryn felt a little tug of remorse that she and Sebastian had dallied when Bethany’s eyes were wide and anxious. 

“Sorry, Beth.  We were just…”

Bethany stopped her sister with raised hands and a wrinkled nose.  “Yes, I can imagine.  I just don’t want to miss anything.”  Aeryn winked at her and

They were quite the striking crew, Aeryn thought fondly.  Fenris in his usual black, Merrill in something surprisingly silky and green, Bethany in her favorite deep rose.   Isabela was, as always, eye-catching in a striking floor-length white corseted dress  that opened at the top of the thigh to reveal her long shapely legs.  She’d even bowed to the formality of the occasion and worn trousers. 

Varric was standing to the side of the wide stained glass windows in his new leather coat with a preoccupied grimace on his broad, handsome features and Aeryn stepped over to join him, concerned.  “Hawke.  Thought you should know there’ve been some interesting people asking about you and about Macie.”

“Oh?  Asking what?” 

“First bunch of questions came in through some Guild contacts.  Couldn’t figure why dwarves from the Merchant’s Guild would be interested in you, so I sniffed around a little.  It isn’t the Guild proper, but I can’t find the source.  I may have to go back to the Marches for a while and look into a few things.”  Varric cocked his eye at her.   “ As for Macie…I thought it was just our own nosing around coming back at first, but whoever’s looking for her knows she came to Denerim with us.  And it’s someone with money and some pretty quiet resources.”

Aeryn frowned.  “I’m not too worried about questions about me.  Sooner or later, someone was bound to start.  But I don’t like the idea of someone looking that hard for Macie.”  There was no reason to look for an orphaned street urchin unless they thought the girl knew something about her guild master’s death. 

Varric shook off his distraction to take a good look at Aeryn for the first time and whistled low before taking her hand to kiss her fingers, making her chuckle as she waved to the others ushering them down to the grand hall.  “Damn, Hawke.  I knew I should have made you go to more of these things when we were in Kirkwall.”

Rolling her eyes, Aeryn smirked.  “No chance.  The one Satinalia I attended at the deLauncets put me off of this sort of foolishness for a good long while.”  Sebastian claimed her hand back from Varric and tucked it into his elbow as they walked.

“Is that the one where Marco Trebin followed you around singing at the top of his lungs like a half-drowned alley cat?” Varric asked.

“Worse.  It was my first masked dance and I went looking for an elegant entertainment, the sort of thing Mother had told us about when we were children.   Not a free-for-all with hardly a single inhibition to be found amongst the lot of Kirkwall nobility.  Mother was eleven different shades of red before the first dance started.”

Isabela chortled in front of them, the tails of the heavily embroidered coatdress swishing enticingly as she descended the stairs.  “Doesn’t sound so bad to me.” 

“I _was_ having a reasonably good time, dancing, watching the foolishness and well, it never hurts to have a little gossip stored away, right?  Mother left as soon as she gracefully could, but she bade me stay.”  Aeryn’s eyes went a little dark, Sebastian noticed, but she shrugged carelessly.  “Anyway, they brought in a mage to do a bit of a display.  Wispy blond girl.  Probably wasn’t twenty.  And she was nervous, too, on top of it.  One of her fire tricks went awry, she set the drapes aflame and some stupid cow got her wig lit as well.  I thought they were going to insist that the Templar make her Tranquil on the spot.  So I…stopped it.”

The tip tilt of her lips told Sebastian that she did not regret her actions.  He wondered how aggressive she had been, so early into her foray into the noble circles. 

“Alyce.”  Bethany whispered and Aeryn’s eyes shot to her sister, who looked pensive and sad.  “Her name was Alyce.  She went and…and didn’t come back.  Ser Matthias was in the dungeon for a month.”

It hadn’t occurred to Aeryn to wonder if Bethany had known any of the runaways Aeryn and Anders had aided.  She’d always imagined, _feared_ , that her sister had been somewhat alone in the Gallows, isolated.  Reaching out, Aeryn squeezed Bethany’s arm and lowered her voice, soothingly.  “I took her to Anders, Beth.  He got her away.  The Templar even helped me with her.  And asked me to knock him out, once we got out of the mansion, so he could have an out.”

“No wonder Thrask thought to come to you for help with the Starkhaven mages.”  Fenris mused from where he was leaning against the stair railing.  “I had thought it curious that he would trust you on such little knowledge.” 

Varric shook his head.  “I’d heard about you causing a scandal with a mage.  Didn’t realize that they’d brought her in for entertainment, though.  Just thought someone caught you on a bad day.” 

Aeryn twitched her velvet-clad shoulder as she twined her arm through her sister’s and they continued down the stairs together, leaving Sebastian to trail them as Varric bowed to a blushing Merrill.  “Anyway, that’s why it was all hushed up; to cover that the nobles were using the mages for entertainment.   I wasn’t invited back to the deLauncets’ again until after I was made Champion.  Not that it was a particular hardship,” she added in a wry aside. 

Bethany paused to straighten the square neckline of her rose silk and gave her a small smile before they turned into the wider hall to meet the crush.  “And here I thought you were going to the teas and wearing fantastic dresses and being wooed by the sons of Kirkwall.  That’s what Mother wrote about, anyway.”

“Not really.  Well,” Aeryn shot Sebastian a sly glance over her shoulder, “maybe once.” 

Yes, he _had_ liked the dress she’d worn to the deLauncets’ that once.  Elegant and black with all the little buttons.  But, Sebastian thought, watching the sinuous curve of Aeryn’s spine as she walked down the stairs, he might find this one even more appealing.  For one, when he played ladies’ maid for her later and peeled it from her lithe body, he’d get to enjoy the fruit of his labor.  Ah.  Well.  That sort of thinking wasn’t going to be helpful in playing the part of sober prince for the nobles he had to meet this evening.

 “Eyes back in your head, Choir Boy,” Isabela purred into his ear.  She chortled at his wink and took the arm Sebastian offered as they followed Aeryn and Bethany.

Dinner itself was almost a private affair. _Well_ , Aeryn assumed, _as private as one could get in a palace, with only the folk living in the residence attending_.  She stood proudly at Sebastian’s side when Alistair introduced them to Lord Robard and then Bann Cleve.

Robard was a dapper older man in his grey formal clothes, not particularly tall but still quite slim, bearing a set of salt and pepper mustaches that any dwarf but Varric would have been impressed by and his hair pulled back in small braids from his high forehead.  He spoke without a trace of Sebastian’s own accent, though.  In fact, Aeryn heard a touch of Orlais in his speech.  Well, she mused, Robard’s wife, Thèrese, was Orlesian.  The sister of Dulcie deLauncet, in fact.  Perhaps it was just a matter of being married so long and picking up the other’s traits. 

He bowed over Aeryn’s hand without a trace of surprise or distaste, apologizing for Lady Therese’s absence as she was visiting with an old friend in Redcliffe, and Aeryn gave him the slight bob of a curtsey that Seneschal Brendan had told her would be appropriate for meeting a member of the nobility who might come under Sebastian’s rule one day, but not yet.  “Courtesy, but not utter deference is the best key, m’lady,” he’d told her.  “Arrogance will set that Free March lot off, sure as certain.”

Well, Aeryn knew that for herself.  Arrogant, she’d been.  Chip on her shoulder, waiting for the nobility to sneer at her as soon as she set foot in their parlors.  No wonder Mother had despaired so.  But Aeryn had learned to temper herself long ago, with a bit of Mother’s influence, a dash of her own maturity, some of Varric’s humor.  A lot of just being tired of feeling angry and cold all the time. 

Bann Cleve was a near giant with only a fringe of white hair around his head.  He stood a couple of inches taller than Sebastian and Alistair and barrel-chested, to boot, power in his shoulders still despite his age.  He wore a neat beard, though, and had a magnificent nose arched and eagle-like.  His green eyes were sharp and assessing, with less of Robard’s elegant manner of disguising interest. 

“Your mother was an Amell, eh?”  He asked but didn’t give her a chance to answer before going on.  “Leanne?  Pretty girl, I recall.  She kept company with my son’s set, once upon a time.” 

“Her name was Leandra.” 

“Was?” His brow scrunched.

“My mother passed on while we were in Kirkwall, serah.”  Sebastian glanced down, but Aeryn betrayed no hint of the turmoil her mother’s death had caused her. 

“I am sorry to hear that, my lady.  May she rest at the Maker’s side.”  The bann’s voice was rumbly and sincere, but though she could hear a slight accent, it was nowhere near the quality of Sebastian’s own rich brogue.  What was going on there, Aeryn wondered as she smiled at the man.  Bann Cleve wasn’t of Starkhaven proper if she recalled, but still.  Accents weren’t usually so clearly defined as that. 

The dinner, lavish with delicacies, went smoothly.  No one intended to drag Starkhaven’s business into the queen’s Satinalia Ball, and such things were set aside for the moment.  

The Palace had been festooned with greenery and more of the traditional blown glass balls.  The great hall was transformed through candlelight and mirrors into a dazzling display.  It wasn’t as elaborate as the balls that Sebastian recalled in his parents’ court, certainly not as excessive as the ones he’d seen in Kirkwall, but it was an enchanting enough sight that even Fenris was almost smiling as he watched Bethany attempt to look blasé for her first formal ball.  Varric was smirking as Merrill dragged him and Isabela off to examine how exactly the candlelight was being reflected.

Dierdre, glowing in a rich brown and gold gown, made her welcomes and declared that the dancing would begin and Alistair bowed over her hand and carefully steered his wife, now obviously pregnant, across the floor.  Sebastian waited a few beats before whirling Aeryn into the dance. 

The queen had insisted.  “You want to make your claims, Prince Sebastian.  And being invited to open the dancing is one of those fancy Orlesian ways of doing things.  It will mean less to the folk here, but your ambassadors and lords will understand.”

Aeryn sighed softly at Sebastian’s warm roughened fingertips against her back as she looked up into his eyes.  A moment to relax.  She and Fenris would be on guard for most of the evening, as a final promise to Alistair, who was worried about whispers of stolen invitations to the ball that had come to Varric’s notice.  She, along with Varric and Isabela had spent much of the morning with the guard, going over the sort of things they would notice, if they were trying to break into the palace.  They had vetoed the idea of a masked ball, though it was traditional, due to the king’s concerns.  Fenris had forgone the welcome line to keep his sharp eyes on the guests.  As it turned out, none of the stolen invitations had been used but there was no reason to take chances if they were all there and able to keep careful eyes out.  Still, she would enjoy this one dance.

Sebastian felt the tension leech out of Aeryn’s shoulders as soon as they moved together and pulled her just a touch closer than was proper.  “It’s not so terrible is it?”

“The music’s nice, at least.”  Her fingers tightened on his arm briefly, curling into the rich brown wool of his coat.  “And I enjoy this part.”  The dancers all parted to allow for the movement of the female dancers to make a curtsey.  The ladies then each circled the man to their right to receive a bow in return, before they returned to their respective partners and the whirl of the dance continued.

“Why that part in particular?”  He asked curiously when he had her back in his arms.

She grinned at him, the bright mischief setting off her dimple.  “I like the way your eyes get all narrow and then light up when I come back to you.” 

“Terrible woman.  I like to share no more than you do.”  Despite the warm curl of response low in her belly sparked by the faint growl in his tone, Aeryn was distracted more by the way Sebastian’s words rolled off his tongue.  And reminded.  

 “Tell me.  Why is it that no one else I’ve met from Starkhaven talks the way you do?”

“What?” 

But she noticed the slight red flush that crept up the edges of his ears.  “I’ve met several Starkish nobles, now.  And some mages from the Starkhaven Circle back in Kirkwall.  None of them had your lovely brogue.” 

“Ah.” 

Sebastian glanced aside, that touch of austerity brushed his features and some of the fascination fled.  Her question had made him uncomfortable, she realized.  “What then, love?”

He escorted her to a quiet corner, out of the way of the whirling dancers before he answered.  “They…the nobility of Starkhaven, I mean…do not use the native language much, anymore.  It’s a sign of lack of education.” 

“You do not lack for education, Sebastian Vael.”  

“No.  Though I did not attend my lessons particularly readily, as a boy.  Unless my bow was involved.  My Grandfather and later my tutors may have bribed me on occasion.”  He toyed with her slim, gloved fingers before looking up at her as the music ended and dancers shifted partners.  “ _Leannan_ , it’s something of a long story.  Will it wait?” 

Aeryn regarded him solemnly, the amusement she’d felt before gone, before stretching up to brush his smooth shaven cheek with soft lips.  “It matters little to me how you came by your lovely way of speaking, darling man.  Tell me later, if you want, or not.”

Counting on the privacy of shadows, Sebastian leaned his head forward to press his forehead against hers, briefly. “It's nothing dire,  _mo chridhe._   Only a bit of youthful stubbornness that grew into something else. “

Just past Sebastian’s shoulder,  Aeryn caught sight of Fenris and Isabela near the queen.  "All right.   I should get back.  There are some new arrivals I need to look over."

"Yes."  He tucked her warm hand into the crook of his elbow and escorted her back to the center dias.

Aeryn and Fenris drew eyes as they made a turn around the room, exactly as they intended.  They were striking in their coloring and the grace with which they moved and anyone who didn't turn a glance their way was intent on something besides the table of tiny pastries or the music and Isabela, Sebastian and Varric meant to see them.  No one stood out, though and as agreed beforehand the two then divided, Aeryn covering the groups of attendees and Fenris to prowl the edges. 

With a sigh, Sebastian tore his eyes away from Aeryn’s neat form meaning to find one of the men he hoped to speak with later, when Isabela popped up near his elbow.  “Come on, Choir Boy.  Give a girl a dance.”

“If you like, Captain.”  He didn’t bother to hide his surprise, but bowed over her bejeweled hand and stepped back onto the floor. 

They were several bars into the promenade before Isabela spoke to him again.  “You’re off to Starkhaven, then?” she asked in a flat tone, stripped of her usual teasing.

“As soon as can be arranged, as Aeryn told you.  I am sorry that we cannot wait for the _Siren_ to be readied.  She will miss having you with us.” 

Isabela nodded, almost absently, but then in a whirl of her long white coat, turned to meet him, jarring him out of step before he could compensate.  “You need to keep both of those pretty eyes on her, Vael.”

“And why do you say that?  Aeryn’s well capable of looking after herself.” 

With a snort, Isabela shrugged.  “Hawke is well capable of waltzing herself smack into a nest of pit vipers and then waltzing out with a new handbag and a pair of boots, but that’s not what I meant.”  She switched feet, taking the lead to step them around an elderly couple.

He let her lead a moment with a sigh.  “What are you going on about, Isabela?”

“You know how she gets, Vael.”  The pirate’s normally sparkling golden gaze was darkly hooded.

He took back the lead before he spoke.  “Do I need to remind you that I hired her as a mercenary, twice?  I'm well aware of her skill and her tendencies.”

“No, you're not.  You hired her and you've fought with her but it’s not the same.”

Sebastian felt oddly defensive.  “She battled demons for me.”

“No.  She battled demons for your coin and maybe your sweet smile.  But you've never seen her grin at certain death and ask it to dance to save your ass.”  For just a second, a flash of something that looked like regret crossed Isabela’s beautiful face. “She will, Sebastian.  Without one damn thought of what it will cost her or the collateral damage.  And your vaunted Maker _help_ you if you don't realize it now.  Sometimes I wonder what would have happened if Anders would have just asked her to start a war.  A few years ago, I mean.”

Ah, but Sebastian had the answer to that, from Aeryn’s own lips.  More gently, he asked, “I do know.  But how exactly am I supposed to stop her, Captain?  You know as well as I do that…” _that she’d throw herself to the wolves, exactly as she’d sworn, once._

“She’ll do exactly what she thinks she needs to?” When he nodded, she shook her head.  “I didn’t figure it out, either.  But you have to.  Or…”  She broke off with a shrug that jangled the heavy bracelets she wore and sketched him a curtsey that just managed to be shallow enough not to spill the cleavage she displayed so winningly.  With that she stepped away, to corner one of the servants by the drinks table, leaving Sebastian to ponder. 

He noted Fenris and Aeryn, casing out a too enthusiastic admirer of the queen.  Aeryn sliding in beside the man, while Fenris prowled up behind him, to stand gloweringly at his shoulder until the fawning noble decided to remove himself.  With Aeryn’s slyly smiling curtsey to Dierdre, the partners blended back into the edges of the room while Sebastian went to find Bethany.  He’d promised Aeryn to look after her sister, but the dark-haired young woman was already dancing with a tall, blonde man who moved like a soldier.  She seemed well suited enough.    

 As Sebastian passed him, Bann Cleve snagged his sleeve.  “My lord?”

It was clear the man wished to talk privately so Sebastian indicated one of the alcoves, but not before catching Varric’s eye.   Despite being surrounded by an audience, the dwarf gave him a high sign.  He’d let Aeryn know.  

Bann Cleve had not been well known to Sebastian, when he’d still lived in Starkhaven.  Cleve held a small area outside of Starkhaven rule, but still influenced by the court.  Cleve’s father and Sebastian’s grandfather had been close once, and that was enough to make Sebastian interested in discovering more about Cleve himself.  They had exchanged letters and while still in Kirkwall, he had met Cleve’s secretary to discuss the possibilities of an alliance.

“So, that’s the Champion of Kirkwall?”

Sebastian saw the confusion on Bann Cleve's face. Glancing over at Aeryn, ostensibly chatting with Bann Alfstana he nodded. “This is she.”

“But...she's...so...” The man seemed to be having difficulty forming words. "She doesn't even reach my shoulder?"

Sebastian looked back at Aeryn properly, trying to see her as a stranger might.  Her posture was demure and her movements graceful.  A nice foil to the wickedness of her dress. A lady dressed up as a temptress for Satinalia.

And suddenly, he saw her as Cleve must, the mask instead of who he knew her to be. She looked small, ladylike. Sweet.

Poised, instead of in her usual perpetual motion, she showed only the grace of her elegant hands and her posture. Gloved, her callouses didn't show and the slashed sleeves covered the scars on her shoulder. The color emphasized the alabaster skin and her fine bone structure and Aeryn looked feminine and vulnerable.  Without a word or a motion, she was portraying a contradiction that was guaranteed to confuse and distract most people.

In Kirkwall, she was something of a known quantity. Prowling around in her armor, she'd rarely bothered to hide her sly eyes and her wicked smile, without some reason. Those who had seen her work knew that the lady was, not a deception but a half truth. Even the nobles who had been happy to hide behind her as they sneered, knew the reality.

He'd seen her vulnerable, seen her injured, seen her beg. But he'd never not seen the strength, the power. The stubborn chin, steel spine, the woman poised on the edge of dangerous violence. Even without the three lethal daggers stashed about her, she was more than capable of leveling half the room.  “She is more than she appears, Bann Cleve.  Have no doubt.”

The older man frowned and shifted his bulk on his feet.  “She would have to be.  But…that is not my only question.  That is her sister?”  He nodded over to where Bethany was speaking with Isabela and her cheeks were flushing rosily at one of the pirate’s comments. 

Warily, Sebastian nodded.  “Yes.  _Lady_ Bethany.”

Very softly, so much so that Sebastian almost didn’t hear him, Cleve spoke.  “My sister was also a mage.” 

Oh, my. 

“She was taken to the Circle at the age of eight.  My parents attempted to keep her close, asked the Grand Cleric if it would be possible to have tutors.  Or even Templars…but to no avail.  We didn’t have the power.  Just a nothing bit of a holding and an old name. ” Cleve stared out over the dancers, seeing not them, but things far older and sadder than the dancing nobles.  “She never did more than learn to light candles and lay a bit of frost.  We had letters from her, frequently, and my mother sent her things.” 

The bann fell quiet and Sebastian asked, “What became of her?”

Cleve coughed and rubbed his nose.  “She died, lad.  In the fire that took Starkhaven’s Circle.  She was in the nursery, trying to get the children out if I can believe old, addled Ser Kettrick.”  Aeryn slipped up beside Bethany and the younger sister twined her slim arm with Aeryn’s and continued her conversation.  “Do you mean to rebuild the Circle?”  He came to his point, abruptly, the gruff voice still quiet under the music.

Sebastian assessed the man gravely and then nodded.  “I intend to rebuild it.  But not the way it was.  There will have to be changes to how mages are treated in Starkhaven.”

“And is that decision due to your lady or your own beliefs?”

“I would be lying if I said that the Hawkes had nothing to do with my choice.  I have seen many manifestations of magic in the past seven years, serah.  But none of the Circle kept mages I’ve come across have had better training or better self-control than Bethany Hawke, who was apostate all but a few years of her life.   And we have the tale of the Hero of Ferelden, who travelled with two mages without Templar control.  I’ve come to wonder if by keeping them penned, we don’t do ourselves as much disservice as we do them and their Maker-given gifts.”

“Blood magic…”

“Yes.  There’s danger in magic and I’ve seen that as well.”  Sebastian closed his eyes against the remembered crimson flare.  “But in Kirkwall…many were driven to it, because of Templars who had no curb.  And none of the Chantry’s guidance saved them, either, much to my and Kirkwall’s grief.”

A disturbance at the door suddenly drew their attention.  Guardsmen came to attention as two men in armor burst in, followed by an elderly man, richly dressed in an old fashioned green doublet, with a mane of silver hair.  Sebastian tensed and out of the corner of his eye, saw Aeryn glide to the front of the room as Alistair drew Dierdre behind him.  Bethany and Merrill, the only ones of them who were fully armed without the need to conceal a weapon had been tasked with immediate protection detail and they flanked the king. 

Alistair was glaring at the intruder.  “Explain yourself, Bann Corin.” 

The man made a poor attempt at a bow, mostly excused by his age.  “Your Majesty.  I must apologize for my intrusion upon your…party.  I had not meant to attend.  But it has come to my notice that you are harboring a criminal.  Unbeknownst to you, I’m sure.”

The king sighed.  “That is quite an accusation, ser. Can’t it wait until court tomorrow?”

“You would take the chance of allowing a murderer and a kidnapper to dance attendance upon the queen?”

More formally, Alistair came to attention and gravely said, “I would not.  Who do you accuse, so that he might defend himself?”

“Herself.  That common bitch calling herself Lady Hawke.” The man leveled a shaking finger at Aeryn. 

Sebastian was moving before he could catch himself and had the man by the collar, glaring down into his rheumy black eyes and lined face.  “Watch your words, serah, or I will forget the deference due your age.”

“ _Prince Vael_.”  Aeryn rebuked him sharply before continuing in her low and dangerous tone from where she stood alone at the center of the room, the crowd having pulled away from her, the dark color of her dress accentuating her curved figure in the reflected candlelight.  “I would hear this man’s accusation myself, Your Highness.”

Reluctantly, Sebastian heeded the warning in her words, slowly uncurling his fingers from the rich cloth.   Corin shook himself free with a glare before rounding on Aeryn. 

“You killed my son, whore.” 

“Corin!”  Alistair shouted, which thankfully drowned out the growl from Sebastian and an echo from Fenris who had moved silently up behind them, green eyes narrow and fixed on the noble’s shoulderblades.  “State your claim without further insulting a woman who recently saved the life of our queen.”

Bann Corin stalked away from Sebastian, towards Aeryn who watched his approach with a raised eyebrow.  He was not much taller than she, but he attempted to loom over her.  Aeryn smiled inwardly.  Close enough to put him down, now, if he tried something stupid.  His guards, standing to either side, were clearly uncomfortable with their employer’s insistence.  They’d be slowed down by that, she thought, not quite so willing to act. 

 Sebastian felt his fingers twitch, missing his bow.  Aeryn did not need his protection, he reminded himself, and he needed to lay claim to a calmer temper.  There were eyes on him now, people that he needed to impress with his restraint.  With a centering breath, he forced himself to calm and watch what Aeryn would do. 

“Who was your son, ser?”  She was all concern and soft curiosity, to the observation of the crowd.

“You make no denial at being called a murderer?”  he sneered.

She gave a small shrug.  “I am called Champion of Kirkwall, too, with little cause.  Names mean nothing without some proof.  Who was your son?”

“Roget of Amaranthine.” 

She _had_ heard the name Corin before, then.  Lies or not? Aeryn glanced at Alistair, whose unease was plain across his features.  She owed him some honesty. 

“I do not deny killing your son, ser.  May I make some defense, Your Majesty?” 

The king nodded.  “Of course.  Speak your piece, Hawke.” 

Aeryn didn’t move, though she could feel Corin’s hot breath on her face he stood so close.  She spoke levelly.  “Roget of Amaranthine,” she used Corin’s title with only a touch of sarcasm, “attacked a young friend of mine under his protection, nearly killed her with a beating.  When I went to confront him, he attacked me.  I defended myself.”

“You murdered…”

Aeryn’s eyes locked on the man, his black eyes reminding her of…Roget?  Yes, but something or someone else as well.  “He approached me in a dark alley accompanied by a knife-wielding back-up.  He grabbed me and I killed him for it.”

“Probably mistook you for a who…” Aeryn’s hand flashed out and caught his wrist.

“Call me that again, ser, and I might forget my manners.”  She could feel his fragile bones shift between her fingers, under his papery dry skin.  “And even whores are allowed to choose their customers in Ferelden, as I recall.”  She released him before the urge to squeeze overcame her. 

Alistair cleared his throat.  “Hawke, was there any witness?” 

She turned to face the king.  “Not to the event, no.  But the Constable and two of the city guardsmen came along shortly thereafter.  I got my information on where Roget could be found from one of the guards and he worried that there might be a problem.  They took my statement and saw the mark on my wrist.”

“Damned lies.  That Constable tried to call my boy a thief.  He probably hired this b…”

It was Alistair’s raised hand that broke Corin off this time, even from across the room.  “I will not tell you again.  Lady Hawke is a guest in my home, a noble protector and even if she were not, I _do not_ like that word, ser.  Restrain yourself or I will do it for you.  If the Constable of Amaranthine wanted your son arrested, the Arlessa would have seen it done.  And if he considered the matter settled, I do as well.  Why did you call the Lady Hawke a kidnapper?”

“She took Roget’s daughter, stole her right out of the boy’s arms.”

Aeryn’s eyes widened slightly.  _Black, sharp eyes.  Wiry frame.  Oh, black bloody Void_.  “What is your granddaughter’s name?” 

Corin straightened, recognizing some sort of victory in her question.  “Macie and since you’ve deprived me of my only son, _lady,_ I demand to know what you’ve done with his daughter!”

“Hawke?”  Alistair had met Macie, knew she hadn’t been nobly raised by any stretch of the imagination.

“She claimed to be an orphan, Your Majesty.  Roget was her thief master as far as I knew and he beat her nearly to death for taking a bit of coin to run a message for me.  Bethany’s the only reason Macie lived.”  Aeryn explained, pitching her voice and the consternation in it to be heard by the closest nobles and was glad to see Bann Alfstana among them, nodding briskly.  “I brought her with me to take her on as an apprentice, thinking her to be alone in the world.”

Stamping his foot, Corin drew their attention again.  “Where is she, then?”

 _Blast._   “I’ve no idea, Bann Corin.  She ran away.”

“You killed her, too!  I demand that she be arrested!  You two…”  As the two bodymen the Bann had brought along reached for Aeryn,  Fenris started from Sebastian’s side to back up his partner.

But Aeryn had had enough.  She snapped the first man’s wrist with one of her twisting motions.  The dress, so decorative and appealing, was cut as it was to allow her free movement.  Nothing stopped the flex of her back or the motion of her arms as she used the attacker’s weight to slam him into the other fellow, tangling them together as she whirled away.  She had knives tucked here and there, but she intended to pull one only as a last resort, here in the royal presence. Not necessary any way.  They were down and she stepped threateningly forward to Corin, but the old man collapsed in on himself suddenly and she pulled up.

To one side, Sebastian heard Cleve whistle appreciatively.  Two men down and Aeryn looked completely at ease.  He supposed he could have asked her and Fenris to put on a display but this would do as well to assure Cleve and Robard of her battlefield experience _.  The Maker and his mysterious ways_.  Sebastian caught her eye and she gave him a tiny little smile.

“Corin!”  Alistair barked as he came forward.  As only the king could dare, he set a hand to the bann and shook him, trying to bring him to his senses.  “I have met your granddaughter.  She was invited to be tutored with my wards and she took it upon herself to leave, preferring not to attend.  Hawke searched for her diligently and we continue to look for her.  We will find her.  But Hawke did not act wrongly.  You have accused her falsely and interrupted my queen’s celebration for something that should have been addressed at court.  Please, man, withdraw.”

“Your Majesty…my only son…the only one left to me after the Blight…”

Aeryn inwardly winced at the broken wheeze and the man’s now limp figure and the way his crabbed fingers clutched at Alistair’s hand, beseeching _.  Poor old, broken, tired man._   But Alistair shook his head when she opened her mouth.  The king was grim in his reply.  “I’m aware of all you have lost, Corin.  But you cannot take it out on Hawke.  And we will find your granddaughter, if she’s to be found, I promise.”

Dierdre called, her rounded form moving briskly in front of her protectors, now that the danger was clearly past.  “Seneschal Brendan, escort Bann Corin to a bedchamber and send for the healer, please.” 

The seneschal bowed.  “Of course, Your Highness.”  He brushed by Sebastian who was moving forward to curve his hand around Aeryn’s waist.  He drew her away from the center of the room and close to her friends, gathered now.

She looked up at him and he touched her face, seeing her regret in the fine line etched between her eyes.  “You couldn’t have done otherwise, Aeryn.  He deserved his fate.”

“Idiot, doing this in front of the court, anyway.” Isabela muttered to Varric, who snorted.  Nobles could always be counted on to be stupid, it seemed.

Aeryn nodded.  “Still, I wonder if Macie even knows?”

Sebastian flexed his shoulders.  “Perhaps it is better if she didn’t.”  She squeezed his hand and smiled at Fenris who was hovering. 

“You showed great restraint, Hawke.” 

“He’s an old man.  And if what he says is true, he’s paid a large tithe for some respect and I’m sorry he only had that wretch to carry on the name.  It’s fine, Fenris.  Come on.  I think we can enjoy the rest of the party.”

 “Really?  Don’t you think we should stay on guard?” Bethany asked, leaning over Aeryn’s shoulder to check her sister’s hands for any cuts or abrasions from her brief tussle. 

“If no one tried to take advantage of that kind of a distraction, I expect  that Dierdre’s safe for the evening.  Now, I heard someone say that the red was from Nevarra.  Do they have good wine?” 

“Generally it is quite acceptable.”  Fenris looked intrigued and then bowed to Bethany, startling a smile from the young woman.  “You also like a glass, I think?”  When she nodded, he continued.  “Good.  Then I don’t have to suffer through Hawke pretending she’s enjoying it and then making faces when she thinks I’m not looking or dumping it into some convenient vessel.” 

“Am I so poor an actress?”  Aeryn widened her eyes comically and Fenris snorted.

“Only when you think it will generate some foolish fun.”  

“Fun is never foolish, you know.  Fine, then.  Off with you!”  But she watched Fenris lead Bethany away to the refreshment table with a thoughtful look.  First time she’d ever seen Fenris willingly go anywhere with a mage. 

Sebastian was content for the moment to have Aeryn’s warm, rough little hand safe in his.  But Bann Cleve was standing next to Laird Robard and Sebastian acknowledged that he must address the situation.  He squeezed and released her hand as she went to check on Dierdre and returned to the Starkish men. "Feeling reassured, my lord?"

"By the Maker. That is...intriguing." He looked at Sebastian. "She...how did she...?"

"Many years of practice."

"You are sure of her...loyalties? A woman that skilled at deception would be a dangerous enemy."

"Oh she's dangerous, no doubt. But my lady is loyal to a fault, have no fear."

Cleve coughed, rubbing his finger over the bridge of his prominent nose and turning it a bit red.   “Bloody icy weather’s given me a cold.  Excuse me.  It isn't just her, Prince Seb...Prince _Vael_. You changed as well.  Felt a little like a mouse happy to be passed over by two hungry cats, the way the two of you look together.”  The big man gave a grin and Robard chuckled elegantly at the incredulous look that crossed Sebastian’s face.  "It is reassuring," Cleve decided.  “Saw you, earlier today.  Kneeling in the Chantry.” 

Sebastian nodded, a bit at a loss.  He’d gone to devotions earlier, but what had that to do with Aeryn? 

“Wasn’t sure, you see.  If you weren’t so devout that you’d still take the people’s side like a too careful priest instead of the prince.  Faith is one thing.  Glad to see you mean yours, don’t get me wrong.  But priests can’t lead a free city.” 

“No.  I agree.  I’ve made my choice, Bann Cleve.  I mean to lead Starkhaven.”

Robard nodded.  "Will she join us in our discussion, Prince Vael?" 

"I imagine she can be persuaded to leave her duties, now." 

 

\---000---

In the small sitting chamber that Harry had escorted them to, Aeryn sat by Sebastian on the low tapestry covered chaise, observing again. 

"Our strategic education and practical experience have been tilted towards the smaller scale.  I think we would both like to hear your viewpoints on large scale encounters," she’d said when Robard had asked.  Aeryn made no attempt to hide that she’d once directed such things herself, which settled Sebastian, but made clear the need to hear them out.   

Sebastian and Robard led the discussion, with occasional interjections from Cleve. 

Neither of them seemed to know of any problem in the city proper with the elves, beyond hearing that the Alienage had been burned.  And Robard looked troubled when he was informed.  “You’re right, I should have known something about that.  And despite my own distractions with the outlawry and the crop failures, I should have heard something from my sister, Beryl, in the estate report.  I’ll send her a message immediately.”

“We need to discuss tactics.”  Cleve pushed aside the mention of the elves for practical matters.  “Do you mean to lead an invasion?  I know you’ve organized some offers of help from other sources.  Are we immediately marching on the city?  How d’you expect to feed them?”

At this, Aeryn stirred and Robard asked, “My lady Hawke, you have been quiet.  Is there anything you might add?”

 _Here we go, then._   “I wonder.  You say the greatest objection that Starkhaven has to Goran is that he has failed to protect them...that lawlessness and banditry have increased?  That trade and the day to day exchange between towns has declined?”

 The elegant drape of her posture on the chaise, the formal language she was using, were both a subtle dismissal of rumors they might have heard about Hawke, Champion of Kirkwall.  Not an uncultured, barbaric, violent, Ferelden.  Not only that, anyway.

"Yes.  The man's clearly allowed his paranoia to overwhelm him.  Keeps the militia and the Guards tied too close to the city proper." She nodded and considered a moment.  This was Sebastian’s cue that they’d worked out earlier and he took over. 

He set aside the cup of tea he’d been handed by the page.  “We've spent a bit of time here in Ferelden and talking to nobles and citizenry.  It seems me that King Alistair's people were won over by his efforts on their behalf.  And I’m aware that my former…infamy and then my status as an ex-priest might cause some discomfort among the more pious nobles.  It would behoove me to cultivate a more princely name before expecting the folk to recognize me." 

Robard frowned and Cleve shook his head.  "I would not throw you to darkspawn to gain a reputation."  Sebastian saw Aeryn’s eyes go dark and the other men caught their breath at the sudden intensity when she interrupted.

"No. I was at Ostagar, serahs.  Trust me when I tell you I would not purposely put our prince in their tainted path for all of Thedas."  

Robard glanced between them, saw them share a moment, a sliver of some deep understanding. 

In a lighter voice, Sebastian continued.  "Such was not my intent, at any rate, my lords.  But Master Tethras and I have been talking.  He's quite the tale spinner, knows how to set a mood.  We've concluded that we might have the makings of a fine story.  That a boy who left Starkhaven to enter the  Maker's service to reform his character could then leave that service to come in aid of his people.  And I just happen to have at my disposal a band of bandit hunters with little peer." 

Aeryn felt a knot of tension release.  Finally.  After Kirkwall’s frenetic pace, it had been rather nice to have little to do but check on rumors for Alistair and run a few new guards through their paces.  But two months of it was enough.  She'd been too quiet recently and the evidence showed in her restless sleep.  She was looking forward to hunting the wretches troubling Starkhaven and decided not to refrain from a smile.  "If it were seen that he comes with his companions, rids them of their troubles, then leaves protection in his wake in the form of gathered troops that have been waiting behind us..."  She arched her elegant eyebrow at the prince, who finished her thought in his warm voice.

"That would aid the towns, garner support and provide a subtle way of spreading troops in easy reach."  Sebastian's brilliant smile sparked her own, though she kept it smaller.  "Goran will only lose ground if he opposes us."

“It is not a perfect plan.  Your more traditional battle strategies will still likely be required come the end."  Aeryn spoke softly and Sebastian sighed, but nodded.

“They will be.  I’ve no doubt.  We must trust that the Maker sees us in the right and pray that the people are not harmed more than we can help.” 

When they glanced at the two men with them, they both were caught to blush, having forgotten for a moment that they weren’t alone.

 “You two are a formidable pair.  Goran won’t know what hit him.”  Robard grinned, his salt and pepper mustaches parting to reveal even white teeth that belied his age.  “We’re in for a time, Cleve.”

Robard noticed that Hawke's small pleased smile was caused neither by their praise nor their acceptance of the prince’s idea.  It was her prince's _smile_ that caused that flash of delight.  Thèrese had been correct in her estimate of their connection. Good.  A love match was always better.  And it was subtly done.  She had allowed Vael to draw the design and then assured them that their plans and contributions would yet be needed. 

After a few small details, plans were set then, for Sebastian and Aeryn along with Fenris, Bethany and Varric to accompany Robard and Cleve, on their ships.  

“Plenty of room.  And it’s been a mild winter, so far, north of the Vimmarks.  Once we get off the seas, there’s no reason not to begin.”  Robard said when Sebastian asked.  “Raven’s Reach is at your disposal, until you’re ready to set out.”

“Sooner the better.”  Cleve agreed.

“Therese was caught in the winter storms between here and Redcliffe.”  Robard continued.  “When she joins us, we can set out.  I suggest you conclude any business you have outstanding, Your Highness.  Starkhaven has need of you.”

\---000---

 It had been different than the small homely sort of celebration Aeryn had once envisioned, but productive and…rather fun. 

“Do you want to return to the dancing?”  Sebastian asked.  She looked up at him.  He was wilting a little, showing some strain at having to be authoritative and princely.  He ran a finger along the embroidered collar, with some discomfort and she decided to take pity. 

“No.  Let’s go back to our rooms.  I’m a bit tired of this dress up, to be honest.”

They were quiet as they ascended the stairs.  Sebastian had that wrinkle at the bridge of his nose that indicated he was thinking too hard about something.  In a soft voice, she asked, “Was it very different?  This ball from the sort you remember in Starkhaven, I mean?”

He gave her a tired smile.  “Yes, actually.  Satinalia was always a masked ball with set dances and high formality.  Very rarely did it include a skirmish for entertainment.”  He squeezed her fingers to show that he was merely teasing. 

“Ah, well.  Wait ‘til we start having them.  Skirmishes for everyone.”  But she said it with a wry twist to her smile and he tugged her closer as they reached their wing, running a hand over her hip. 

“I’d prefer not to see another try and manhandle you in front of the court, _à ruin_.  It does terrible things to my sense of propriety.” 

She leaned into his shoulder.  “So I noticed. But apparently you met the approval of your lords. ”

He gave her a wan smile.  “That was mostly because apparently they was some concern that I might be too priestly to run a city.  As if concern for the souls of my people might be a hindrance.”

“I don’t know, Sebastian.  When you first joined us, I don’t think you were as able a leader as you will be now.  I think the years suppressing your…ah, autocratic tendencies…might have been a hindrance.  The people of Starkhaven will be lucky, I think, to have both sides of you, properly trained in harness, to deal with.”

“I hope you’re right.” 

Aeryn toed out of the soft kid skin slippers she’d worn, as soon as Sebastian closed the heavy door behind them.  She’d forgone the heeled shoes that had originally gone with the dress.  Heels were lovely for tiptoeing and dancing, but she’d anticipated trouble and had been glad for her dedication to practicality when Corin had confronted her. 

Sebastian was standing near the window, gazing out at the snow that covered the courtyard below, reflected moonlight across his face.  He looked a bit worn, her beloved, in need of some sweetness.  Well, she’d had a dance and a fight and a couple of glasses of good cider.  Sweetness wasn’t beyond her.

Padding across the carpet in her silk stocking feet, Aeryn prodded him back until his knees hit the bed and he sat down heavily.  With a _shush_ of velvet she knelt down and unlaced the elegant high boots he’d worn. 

Surprised, he went to stop her.  “I can…”

“Let me.”  Her eyes were soft and her hands were light on his thighs and he sighed.

“Alright.” 

She pulled one of the boots and then the other off, setting them neatly to the side before moving on to the buttons of his waistcoat as he shrugged out of the coat.  Gradually, she relieved him of his costume.  It was hard not to think of it that way.  Accustomed to armor, still surprised to find himself wearing anything but the simple tunic and trousers or the robes he’d donned for years, the finery yet felt like garbing himself in lies.

And they fell away under her nimble, dedicated fingers. 

Sebastian breathed deeply, swallowing when she released the tight collar, her fingertips just brushing the warm skin at his throat.  She ran her hands through his hair, mussing the neatly slicked back auburn locks into waves.  Something lodged in his throat as Aeryn twined one curl on her finger, a fond look on her face.  Bending, she smoothed away the lines on his forehead with gentle lips.

Down to tunic and breeches, he reached for her, hands dallying on her waist.  “I thought the stays were bothering you?”

Here he was, simply Sebastian again.  Time to be done with her own clothes, especially the neatly contrived structure of the waist, with the boned stays sewn in and pressing against her flesh.  It was attractive and supportive, but not, as well made for fighting as she’d hoped.  “You’re welcome to unlace me, serah.”  She turned and he tugged the ribbon ends out from where he’d tucked them earlier, loosening them.  She took a heavy breath of her own, and stretched like a cat as he ran his hands down the lines of her back.  “Mmmm.”

 Sebastian set his thumbs into the divots on either side of her spine as she shrugged out of the slashed sleeves and the dress skimmed down over her hips, revealing her little surprise.

He went quiet and archer-still behind her, and Aeryn twisted to see his face, not quite sure if she’d actually managed to shock him with her brazenness for once.

“Holy Maker. _Aeryn_.”  He let his wandering hands follow the dress down to her lovely arse.  She’d been bare as an egg underneath, but for her stockings and the red ribbon garters and the thigh sheath she was rarely without, holding them up.  Suddenly, Sebastian wasn’t tired at all.  He couldn’t quite get his mind to work, though and gaped for a moment before he could speak.  “You walked around like _this all evening_?”

“Just for you.”  Her eyes were half-lidded as his hands stroked over her skin, setting off sparks.

 _All night_.  When she’d sat across from him at dinner and brushed his calf under the table with her foot.  When they’d danced.  When she’d been skirting the edges of the room and then tossing grown men around like ragdolls.  And all night there’d been nothing between them but that whisper of dark velvet.  His vision went nearly white with need to have her spread before him.

She arched back into Sebastian’s reverent, increasingly hungry, touch, as he traced the curve of her backside, lightly trailing along her hips until she gasped when he slid a finger into the dark red curls at the apex of her thighs.

The crisp hair was damp and her folds slick with the evidence of her desire and his cock, already half hard at her dedicated coddling, went fully rigid with the tiny little moan Aeryn gave when he found her little nubbin to stroke.

In one fluid move, her archer turned her around, lifted her and set her against the wide stone window frame.  Aeryn’s back pressed against the icy leaded glass and she sucked in a breath as her skin scraped against the old stone, damp and chilly, but Aeryn couldn’t care as Sebastian wordlessly dropped to his knees before her, parted her thighs with his broad shoulder and laid a fervent kiss against her hot, wet core. 

Desperate to have him closer, Aeryn drew her leg over his shoulder and clutched his hair, holding him to her as his tongue explored and delved. 

The hilt of the blade she was wearing in the thigh sheath scraped against his ear and he shifted briefly to unbuckle and strip it away, but Sebastian was focused solely on her, the scent of her; musky and sweet and the taste and the way she was already panting his name, as he slid further down, eagerly thrusting his tongue into her slick passage as she pressed into his caresses with her arching, twisting motion.  Her hand fisted in his hair and her calves flexed against his back and she cried out her pleasure into the soft dark around them. 

Aeryn’s head banged against the window as Sebastian stood up, lifting her, pulling her legs down around his waist to carry her to the bed.  He sat her back against the pillows and began to push his silk breeches and smalls down.  She curled up on her knees to press kisses to his stomach, ridged and lean and tasting of salt and sweat, following the line of reddish brown hair.  Pausing where the skin turned palely golden and thin, Aeryn nibbled along the jut of one hipbone as she helped him push the fabric farther, freeing his heavy cock to her impatient touch. 

Opening her lips, she took in the head to lick the pearly drop of seed from the slit. 

Sebastian watched as Aeryn’s eyes fixed on his, her hot little pointed tongue traced the shape of him as her hands caressed the muscle of his arse and he groaned.  He yanked the pins from her hair and they scattered as he threaded his fingers into the dark red glory of silken strands to loosen her neat hair and set it free. 

“Enough.”  She didn’t stop, though, and he tightened his fingers in her hair and pulled away. 

Aeryn pouted up at him.  She loved to have him in her mouth, loved the wicked things he said to her in his cradle tongue as she made him come, her most favorite language lessons.  His thumb drifted across the plumped lower lip, and she stilled with the soft caress.

His eyes blazed as Sebastian pounced, rolling her under him as he drew a peaked nipple into his mouth to suckle.  She chuckled, breaking off in a gasp as he kneaded the other breast familiarly, stroking and thumbing her like a lyre.

Sebastian positioned himself at her entrance, the liquid heat of her sheathe beckoning, but he teased her with only the tip of his cock, letting it slide against her pearl, between her folds as she whined.

“Void….Sebastian, _please_ …”

“Please what, _à ruin_?”  He ground out through his teeth, a fight not to simply meet his mark, not to make her scream as he hilted himself, but he wouldn’t last, not with the image of her bare arse sliding under that velvet skirt all the evening long, not with the fragrance of her, almond and desire, wreathing around him and her flavor on his lips.  He wanted to earn her pleasure again, before he took his own and he shifted his hips, slowly pressing into her before withdrawing to start again. 

Aeryn felt the burning spark of need building, like electricity standing before a spell, like the burgeoning edge of lighting about to streak across the sky, and begged, “Inside me.  I need you, oh, please, please…”

Open want in her voice sent desire throbbing across his veins and he obeyed, drawing her legs up to his shoulders as she flexed her hips to meet him.  Sweat slicked and straining, they crashed together and the urgent encouragement in the soft moans she let slip lashed across Sebastian, driving him, as his hands clutched at her arse to hold her closer as she writhed. 

She couldn’t seem to slow down, even if she’d wanted to.  There was something to be said, after all, for to drawing the pleasure out, but she felt so good…stretched full, complete, and heat poured down her spine as she came, shuddering around him. 

Aeryn’s muscles, toned and strong, seized and fluttered around his cock and Sebastian turned his face against her silk clad calf and mouthed a kiss against it before he slammed once, twice, and again, thrusting fully into her as he came in a rush of sweet spiraling heat. 

Panting, they rested just a minute, hands softly petting, reassuring one another as they came back.  He tugged loose the ribbon garters of her stockings, lest they bind too closely and cut off her circulation, before he slid free to wipe himself off on one of the small linen cloths they kept to hand. 

She pulled him back to her to cuddle, settling into the bed as if they’d been together forever, as if they’d never slept alone and lonely.  The featherbed fluffed around them, surrounding them in warmth and muffling the music still drifting up from the dancing.   

He let his hands drift over the warmth of her skin, frowning slightly when he hit a bit of scraped skin on the back of her thigh, making her hiss.  “Are you all right?  Was I too rough, then?”

Grinning against his shoulder, Aeryn stretched lithely, popping the last kinks from her back.  “Oh, yes.  I was complaining the whole time.  I’m sure they heard me all the way to Orzammar.”

“ _Mo chridhe_ …”

Reaching up one finger, languidly, she paused his thought on his lips.  “I _like_ it when you forget yourself, Sebastian.  You have so much control, love, which I admire.  But I…like it rather _a lot_ when you lose it for me.  Hmm?”

He was quiet for a moment and Aeryn pushed herself up on his chest to get a good look at his face.  He was brooding a bit, again, in the dwindling firelight.  “You would tell me if I went too far?” he asked, trailing his fingers down her cheek and she kissed his hand before he cupped her face.  “If I ever _hurt_ you?” 

“I would tell you.”  She assured him before she yawned.  Ah, well.  She’d meant to dress again and make sure her band made it back up safely, but they were all adults.  Even Bethany.  They could sound the alarms if they needed her.  “Your need matches my want, darling man.  Made and matched, never doubt that.”

“Right.”  He relaxed underneath her finally, reassured and she laid her head down to let his steady heartbeat and measured breaths lull her.  “Bath?” he asked her a few moments later, somewhat reduced to monosyllables by the wave of exhaustion that washed over them.

“Bath later,” she mumbled against his chest and he grinned against her hair, even as he closed his eyes.

“Hmm.  Later. Love you.”

Her thumb stroked gently against his cheekbone.  “Love you.”

 


	19. Chapter 19

Aeryn whimpered softly in her sleep and Sebastian instinctively drew her closer to his chest, tugging the heavy woven coverlet back over the chilled skin of her shoulder.  The fire had burned low but between the two of them they hadn’t lacked for heat until she’d yanked the blanket awry, restlessly. 

Sleepily, he whispered into her ear, rubbed his hand in soothing circles on the smooth skin of her stomach and Aeryn relaxed as she burrowed her cold nose into the crease of his arm.  She was still sound asleep, this night's dream easily chased away by a bit of comfort. 

At least one of them was. 

Sebastian had been wary, sleeping lightly, the last couple of nights since her last nightmare had torn them from their bed.  But she was settled now and he closed his eyes again, drifting along with the sounds of her breathing, slow and steady. 

A rustling at the window drew him back as the hair on the back of his neck rose.

In his arms, Aeryn was suddenly awake and he could feel her awareness in the coiled tension that ran along her spine.  Sebastian’s broad shoulders were blocking her from the window, hiding her from view.  The cold pommel of a dagger was pressed into his hand and once his fingers closed around it, she tapped his wrist. 

 Sebastian released her and she slid off the edge of the bed, grateful for the rug that would swallow any sound she made, and disappeared into the shadows.

The intruder had a light tread, Aeryn had to give him credit.   She might not have heard him at all, except for the papers on the desk that had moved with the air from the open window, a variable that couldn’t be accounted for.  Under the high bedframe she watched stocky legs move slowly, patiently towards Sebastian and his seemingly unaware, apparently sleeping form.  Dwarf, then.  Leather boots, the soles padded with felt.  An assassin and one who knew his business. 

She felt no qualm about the poison on her own blade, wishing it was a more lethal mix.  The bastard was close enough.  Quick as a snake, Aeryn reached behind his ankle and yanked. 

The dwarf’s lower center made him stumble rather than fall, but Aeryn wrapped herself around his feet and rolled, succeeding in pulling him down as Sebastian scrambled to his own feet and stepped on the intruder’s knife hand, pinning him.  In another second, she’d straddled the dwarf’s broad chest, locked her fingers in his greasy hair, and had her knife at his throat.  “Who in flames are you and what do you want?” she snarled into the fellow’s dark, wide eyes.

He stopped struggling to stare at her.  “I serve Corypheus.  The blood of the Hawke will release him and he will rule.” 

“Yes, well, good luck with that.” 

“You are not the only Hawke,”  he swallowed, his poorly shaved throat scraping against the blade of the knife she held.    

There was a shriek and then a flurry of noise from outside their room and Aeryn shouted at Sebastian.  “I’ve got him go get Beth…”  The dwarf gave a horrid gurgle and when she looked back at him, foul bloody foam was oozing from his slack mouth and the dark eyes had gone dim.  “ _Void_!”  She pushed off his chest and spun to the door as Sebastian grabbed his breeches. 

A harsh crack sounded as Aeryn flung the door open and a familiar blaze of bluewhite light as Fenris tore after the figure that had been blasted from Bethany’s room with one of her force spells.  There was a scream and the temperature dropped as she ran to aid her sister.  Two other dwarves were impaled on icy spikes and Bethany was standing to the side of the bed in her nightgown, glaring fiercely.  Her staff swung towards Aeryn who ducked and shouted.  “Beth, it’s me.  Just…”

She pulled the staff up swiftly, “Oh, Maker.  Aeryn!”

“Is that all of them?”

“There was another,” Bethany pointed out her door but Sebastian called from the study.

“He’s quite dead, as well.” 

“It’s very messy, the way you do things, Fenris.”  Merrill had joined them, it seemed. 

Aeryn approached the wide-flung window and looked down the wall.  Grappling hooks were lodged in the trellis beneath Bethany’s room but the courtyard below was empty.  The thud of boots sounded up the hall and Aeryn glanced down at herself.  “Um.  Can I…” she caught the wrapper that her sister flung at her and pulled it around her bare shoulders.  “Thanks.  Are you alright?”

Bethany nodded, her pretty face ashen.  “Yes.  They didn’t touch me.”  She took Aeryn’s offered hand and squeezed, tightly. 

To Aeryn’s surprise, it was Alistair who burst into the lounge, fully dressed and sword drawn; young Harry and two guards were behind him.  “Hawke!  What’s going on?”

“Intruders,” she pointed out the one Fenris had dispatched.  “I’m afraid we’ve made a bit of a mess.”

The king waved away her apology, “Can’t be helped.  What did they want?”

“Aeryn.”  Sebastian answered grimly. 

“Actually, they just wanted a Hawke.  I think Bethany was the main target.”  She shook her head, “Although why they thought she was the easy hit, I can’t imagine.” 

Fenris held out the dagger his had victim carried. “It smells of magebane.  I imagine they expected Bethany would be rendered helpless before her magic could affect them, as dwarves.”  Aeryn took it, looking the dagger over carefully.  It was of dwarven make, though plain and not a high example of their craft.  She joined Sebastian by the body and knelt to pat it down.  No papers.  No marks, beyond a mark similar to the casteless brands she’d seen on some of the dwarves that had followed Varric’s brother into the Deep Roads.  The one that had broken into her room hadn’t had that, even. 

“Well, if I was foolish enough to use a glyph or a sleep spell, I suppose.  Primal magic doesn’t seem to care; dwarf, elf or human.”  Bethany smiled a little smugly.

“An ice spike impales indiscriminately,”  Alistair agreed after glancing into Bethany’s room to look over the damage.  “Run and get the chambermaids, Harry.  Tell them to bring their buckets.” 

Aeryn jerked her head back towards Bethany’s room.  “Sebastian, look over the two in Bethany’s room while I look at our guest.” 

“It’s too bad you killed him,” Sebastian shook his head before he moved to do as she asked.  “We could have asked him a question or two.”

“I didn’t, though.”

“Hmm?”                            

“I didn’t touch him, hardly, though I fully intended to.  I think he poisoned himself,” she said thoughtfully as she turned on her heel to investigate.

The rest followed her into her room and she let Bethany light a candle for her, the small light casting a circle around her feet as Aeryn examined the corpse.  “See the froth around his mouth?  That’s some sort of plant poison, bitter almond probably.  Something he had on him and ready to swallow before he even started speaking.”  She knelt down and patted his pockets.  Not even a pouch, just an unmarked scabbard and another set of daggers as plain as the other.

Alistair asked Sebastian casually as the prince returned from his examination of the bodies in the other room, “Does it ever bother you that your lady can identify a poison at a glance because of the gruesome traces it leaves?”

“I _will_ call it one of her more peculiar charms.”  Sebastian allowed before telling her, “One was casteless, one had no brand.  Nothing else I could see, though the boots of one of the casteless bore a maker’s mark from Wycome.”

“In the Free Marches?” 

Sebastian nodded, grimly.   “There’s a fair amount of wear, though.  They could be second-hand.”

Aeryn sighed.  “We’d better ask Varric if he can tell us anything that we wouldn’t know, just looking at them.  His guild ties might be able to shed some light as well.” 

Alistair directed his guardsmen to move the bodies to a storeroom for the time being so that the maids who were hovering in the outer room could start their cleaning and then took his leave.  Aeryn offered to help and Sebastian couldn’t help but laugh a little at the maid’s scandalized rejection.  Aeryn  smacked his shoulder before she asked Harry to run a message to Varric.

After she sent the page on his way, Sebastian glanced at her standing with her arms crossed  and her hip cocked, looking a bit like an annoyed decorative songbird in Bethany’s frilly pink robe trimmed in pale fur, the long hem pooling around her feet.  “That’s an interesting choice of attire.” 

Rolling her eyes, Aeryn said, “Bethany is fond of the color but I’m well aware it doesn’t do _me_ any favors.  Better than skin, though, right?” 

With a small smile, he shrugged, “If you want my honest opinion, no not really.”  He leaned over to whisper the last in her ear and she chuckled.

“C’mon.  Might as well get dressed.  It’ll be daylight soon.  Hey, Fenris?”   Her partner had just returned from washing the blood from his hand.

“Yes?”

“Thanks for getting that last one.  Ah, did you hear them come in?”  Fenris’ room was on the opposite side of the floor from Bethany’s, and Aeryn was curious to know how he’d known Beth was in trouble so quickly.

To her surprise, a small flush crept up his neck but he answered levelly enough.  “I was awake.  I came out to see if there were any of the apples left.”  He indicated the bowl of spilled fruit, overturned in his pursuit of the dwarf. 

“I was awake, too,”  Bethany said.  “They came in while I was looking for a snack.  We were chatting when we heard the noise in my room.” 

“Oh.  Well.  That worked out well, then.”  Aeryn looked between the two of them.  Fenris was looking up at her through his bangs, the towel he’d dried his hands off twisted in his grip.  Bethany had turned to pick up the fallen apples, since the maids were busy with bloodier cleaning, but she had a tiny pleased smile on her face that Aeryn found intriguing.  _What in the world?_   “I’ll just get your robe back to you, then.”

“No hurry.”

Aeryn glanced at Sebastian and he followed her back to their room.  The guards had already hauled their assailant out and, besides the open window, the papers that had blown off the desk, and the frigid temperature that the dying fire couldn’t dispel, there was no sign of any disturbance left.  He shivered as he pulled the sash closed and drew the heavy velvet hangings back while Aeryn stirred the coals. 

Laird Robard’s wife was due to return by the end of the day, and they had decided to spend the waiting running a few last minute errands.  Herren had sent word that their armor was ready and Bethany needed to stock up on potion supplies.  That would have to wait, now, until they met with Varric and discovered what the assassins had been after.

“I do not think they were, though,” Sebastian said to himself.

Aeryn heard him, though.  “Don’t think they were what?”  she asked, tucking her tunic into her trousers as she walked back to him.

“Assassins.”  When she tilted her head, questioningly, he continued.  “He said you wanted your blood, the _Hawke_ blood, not that he wanted to kill you.”

“I’m opposed to letting anyone have my blood or Bethany’s, love.  He’d have _had_ to kill me to get it.” There was a grim gleam in her eyes and Sebastian reached out to touch her cheek.

“Do not say it so lightly, _leannan_.”

Looking up into his face, Aeryn saw traces of weariness and worry.  He’d not been sleeping well since the last time she woke him with her nightmares.  And now he’d been rousted out of bed by someone else trying to kill her.  “Why don’t you lie back down?  Fenris, Beth, and I can talk to Varric.”

“I think I would not sleep much. I would rather come with you.”

 _Try again, Aeryn_.  “You mentioned you had an errand to run to the chapel.  You’d be in time for the early Chant if you went now.”  It was a leading sort of urging.  He hadn’t been since the morning services before the Satinalia party a few days ago.  Nor was he praying as regularly as he had, not since his confrontation with the Grand Cleric.  He’d told her he was comfortable with his decision but she wasn’t sure it was true.

Sebastian shrugged.  “I’ve not been much in the mood to listen to sermons.”  He wrapped his arms around her waist and she settled against him, pressing her cheek against his chest and letting the steady thud of his heartbeat thread through her, calming her own faster pulse. 

“I thought you liked Alistair’s chapel?” 

“It’s not the same, though.”  He sounded petulant, even to himself, and tried to explain.  “I miss the…there’s a feeling, you see, in the full congregation.  And I…I feel as though I’m not…connecting well, on my own. I’m fine, Aeryn.”

He wasn’t though.  If he was having trouble praying, then his concentration would suffer elsewhere.  It might even affect his archery.  Aeryn took a deep breath.  _Put up or shut up_.  “I’ll come with you, if you like.”

“Really?”

“Just to watch your back.”

“I did have an errand.”  He stroked his hand up her spine and smiled as she hummed and arched into it.  “You’ll come?”

She only hesitated a moment before she nodded.  He searched her face, “Alright, then.”  He was pleased enough to be rewarded with an unusually gentle kiss, her hand caressing his cheek before skidding down to his shoulder.

With a wink, Aeryn  ran her hands over his bare, broad shoulders and grinned.  “You’d best dress, then.  Can’t have you scandalizing the sisters.”

The palace chapel was lit by candles, though in Ferelden it seemed natural wax was more common than the traditional, far more expensive, red that had stained the altars in Kirkwall.   The lighter, sweeter incense that Aeryn had noticed at the Birth Rock hung in the air.  There were only the two sisters who aided Mother Beatrice and a handful of servants attending this earliest of Chants, but the chapel wasn’t so large as to feel empty. 

Aeryn’s eyes darted around the room.   Sebastian sighed when she squeezed his hand left him to walk the edges and he took a deep lungful of the incense, counting on its presence to set his mind into a more contemplative measure. 

A few minutes later, though, he was startled out of his meditation when she returned to kneel gracefully beside him.  He couldn’t help it, he turned and stared at her.

She raised one neat red eyebrow at him.  “Don’t expect me to Chant.  But I can kneel, can’t I?” 

“Of…of course.”

The cantor started in on the Book of Transfigurations and Sebastian joined in reflexively.  But he kept glancing at Aeryn out of the corner of his eye, wondering if he’d hit his head at some point during the night.

Mother Beatrice gave her sermon; a meaty, thoughtful treatise on the sixth verse of Transfigurations.  He kept being distracted by the play of Aeryn’s attention to the sermon across her features, though.  After the benediction, she rolled back up to her feet and brushed her hand over his hair.  “I’ll be over by the bookcases, when you’re done speaking with Mother….” 

He watched her back as she withdrew, only just managing to close his mouth before the Revered Mother came to greet him. 

“Maker's blessings upon you, child."

Recovering himself, Sebastian answered, "And upon you, Your Reverence.  I was hoping to make a donation in thanks."

"Well, that's joyful news." She took the pouch, and judged its weight as shrewdly as the madam at the Rampant Sailor had done.  "You are generous, child."  Her eyes were a sparkling hazel, beautiful in a lined face that had never been more than plain, reflecting the true peace of one of the Maker's honest servants.

"I have been fortunate, Your Reverence, it seems only right and good to be equally as generous.  And I have a request to make of you."

"Oh, what might that be?"

"I’ve noticed, there are a lot of street children here in Denerim."

Nodding, Beatrice agreed, "Sadly.  The Blight left many wards, though I must say King Alistair has set many measures in place for us to aid them."

"I would prefer to have that go to such an effort. And,” he hesitated, before deciding to continue.   “I have this bit of coin for one in particular.  I was hoping I might leave it in your trust, should she ever come looking for help."  He explained about Macie, giving a description and handing the mother a letter he'd written urging the girl to send for them, through Varric’s contacts.  “We must go.  I have duties to attend, but I would not want her to need this and not have it.  She might come here, looking for us.”

“It’s thoughtful, Your Highness.  I will keep an eye out for your ward.”  She glanced at Aeryn, who was perusing the shelves.  “I have not seen Lady Hawke with you before.”

“No.” 

“Should I greet her or will I be making it more difficult?” 

“I think,” Sebastian paused again, taking a good look at Aeryn.  Her back had gone a little stiff and he saw her watching the servants as they exited.  She had come.  It was enough. “I think, perhaps not today, Your Reverence.”

“We come to the Maker in our own time.  I think you know that, better than most.  Have patience with her.”

“Always.” 

Sebastian managed to keep his curiosity to himself until they reached the grand stairs that would take them back to their rooms.  He stopped and sat down on one of the long benches that lined the hall. 

 _Here we go, then._   Aeryn sat, primly beside him, folded her hands in her lap, and met his gaze with just a touch of amusement in her eyes.

“I’ve known you for…Maker, seven years.  We met in a Chantry.  _Mo chridhe_ , you have never knelt for services in all that time.”

“No, I haven’t.” 

“Why now?” 

With a small shrug, she told him.  “I cased the place out a few days ago.  There are six windows, all far too high to scale without some sort of noise and only the one entrance.   I could see it in the reflection from the glass in that closed bookcase behind the altar without half trying.  You picked a good spot.”

Dryly, Sebastian replied, “That’s not exactly what I meant and well you know it.” 

“We were safe enough, once I’d checked the corners. “ 

And she would dodge and weave all morning if he let her, he knew.  Instead, he touched her chin with careful fingers.  “And again, not what I meant.”

The amusement in her eyes was gone, replaced with the small wrinkle between them that had faded since Kirkwall, but would never go away entirely now.  “You needed me there.  And I told you, I miss hearing you pray.  If I have to go to Chant to hear you, so I will.”  She’d hugged herself, broadcasting her discomfort with the subject and for a brief moment, Sebastian thought to drop it. 

But he had to ask.  “And this has nothing to do with the fact that you think you will need to be seen as a lady of a certain, ah, pious sort?”  He did not want her there out of duty, out of some falsehood.  He could not allow her to use that as a mask.  Better she never set foot in another Chantry, than lie about it that way.  To him, to the Maker, to the city they would call home. 

 _Deserve that one.  “_ No.  I promised, Sebastian.  I will not do that.  I wanted to be with you this morning.  I won’t always come, but…there was no betrayal to be found here.  It’s not always there, waiting for me  like a monster under the bed.  I can…I know it.”

Her words were sure, but in them he heard the echo of the story she had told him years ago.  The first thing she remembered of the Chantry was the sister who tried to capture her father after the man had healed her.  Betrayed again and again by the Chantry.  But she trusted him enough to want to sit with him. 

Sebastian tugged one of her hands loose from where shed tucked it against her side and kissed the inside of her wrist.  “I will pray with you anytime, Aeryn…”

“I wanted to hear _you_ , Sebastian.  I wasn’t praying.” 

And he heeded the caution in her voice.  “As you wish.”  The last thing he wanted to do was to make her self-conscious enough that she wouldn’t repeat the event.

With a decided sense of relief that Sebastian would let it lie, Aeryn stood, pulled him to his feet and they headed back to their rooms.

He asked as they climbed the stairs, “Do you think me foolish? To leave that bit of coin for Macie?"

“Not really.  Perhaps it’ll remind her that we’re concerned for her.  It wasthoughtful of you.”

He smiled at her and tucked her hand into the bend of his elbow.  “If she thinks we want her to follow us, it gives her an option besides running to her grandfather if the street gets to be too much.  I didn’t like him.”

“Nor did I.  Let’s hope she’s smart enough to take the chance, this time.”

 

They were finishing breakfast when Varric came up.  Aeryn tossed him a honey cake and he munched it as Harry showed them down to the stable where the bodies had been moved.

“No chance they’ll decay in this weather while the ice lasts,” Varric mused as he dusted the crumbs from his coat and glanced over the corpses.  He stopped suddenly, turning back to the casteless dwarf Fenris had ripped the heart from. Frowning, he looked closer at the tattoo on the pallid face.  “Hawke?  This isn’t a casteless brand.” 

She came up to look as well.  “Isn’t it?”

“There are a couple of variations, and sometimes a Carta dwarf will add to one or something…but this is different.  Damn.  I’ve seen this before.  Recently.”  His thumb stroked along Bianca’s stock soothingly and Sebastian grinned inwardly as he felt compelled to look away from the intimate touch.  Varric’s attitude towards his crossbow was catching.

“I didn’t realize.  I just assumed.”  Aeryn grinned at Varric’s exasperated headshake. 

“I could say something about human ignorance but I won’t.  Damn, where did I…oh.  Well, shit.” 

The sort of realization that had dawned in Varric’s light brown eyes never boded well.   With a sigh, Aeryn asked warily, “What?”

“I saw it on a letter I got from an…old friend of mine.  He wanted to meet you, said he’d heard some pretty good stories.  Sent me an invitation to meet him up in the Vimmarks.  But it was right after you got back from Orlais and I figured you’d had enough of travel, just then.”

“That’s not exactly recent.”

“I pulled it out again not long ago.  I was trying to figure out exactly where he was on a map I came across in that Wonders of Thedas shop.”  He tapped the corpse’s cold stiff cheek.  “That was the mark on the wax seal.” 

“So…you’re thinking we should go see why your friend is mixed up with people who want my blood?”

Varric grimaced.  “No.  I’m thinking we should stay as far away from the Vimmarks as we can get.  But if they’re willing to come into the palace here in Ferelden, I’m not sure you’ll be any safer anywhere in the Marches.”

“Aeryn…”  Sebastian had recalled something that sent ice through his veins.  “Did you not tell me that you’d had…visitors to your estate.   That a dwarf once hid in your armoire and broke out in the night, calling for your blood to take to his master?”

She scoffed.  “That was years ago.  It can’t be the same thing.”

Fenris asked gravely.  “When was this?  I do not recall you ever saying anything about intruders.  Well, other than Isabela.”

“Yeah, me either.” Varric was frowning.

“Maker, please.  If I told you lot about every idiot who tried to kill me, you’d have never let me out of the house.  It was right after the Arishok.  I just assumed it was another Carta or Coterie fool trying to make his name as an assassin.”

“How often did that happen?”  Bethany looked as worried as Sebastian and Aeryn waved her hand, trying to fend off their concern.

“Now and again.  It happens.  You have a reputation and it’s fairly common for another assassin to want to up their own by taking you out.  After the Arishok, I was a pretty target.”  Aeryn sniffed at Bethany, who had narrowed her eyes at her sister, wanting a proper answer. “A dozen times probably, in the first few months after the siege.”

Sebastian rubbed his forehead while Fenris made a disparaging sound.  “Hawke…”

Chuckling, she patted Fenris’ gauntlet.  “And what would you have done?  Stood guard ‘round the estate?  Set up camp on my balcony?”

Varric was scowling at her as well.  “I could have eased up on the stories for awhile.  Might have helped.”

“To what end?  Anyway, those stories netted you a nice profit and several rounds of free drinks.”  She exclaimed at their various protests, “Enough! Sodding Void, it’s been years ago now.  We have things to do.”

Recognizing that Aeryn had taken as much of their fussing as she would stand without shutting them out, Fenris asked Varric, “Where in the Vimmarks did you say your friend was?”

Varric pulled a folio out of his knapsack and flipped through the papers, finally setting a map on the long table in front of him.   He traced his finger along the familiar line of the mountains.

“North and west of Kirkwall.  It’s something of a wasteland up around there, not much on the map at all except some canyons and a few dry lakes.  Old stories claim that the second Blight started near there, made it nearly uninhabitable.” 

Aeryn had stalked away from them to lean against the doorframe, putting some distance between her and their concern, but she turned back when he started to ponder routes.  She couldn’t let Varric make plans until he understood that she would not come with him.   “I understand you might want to go and deal with your friend.  Sebastian and I need to head to Starkhaven.”

Startled, Sebastian protested, “Aeryn, I’ve no intention of going to Starkhaven when there are people out to kidnap you or Bethany.  We must deal with this first.”

“But…”

“No chance, _mo chridhe_.  It’s too dangerous a complication.” 

Aeryn frowned up at Sebastian.  He’d taken on that austere, ‘I expect to be obeyed’ quality that boded well for his ability to command.  She’d be damned before she’d just give into it here, though.  “You have other responsibilities than swathing me in cottonwool, Prince Vael.  Robard and Cleve expect you to begin your campaign.” 

Her eyes went wide as a hot flush burned across his cheeks and something fierce blazed in his gaze but Fenris broke in, when it seemed Sebastian was about to shout at her.  “Hawke, Sebastian is correct and you know it.  It is foolish to allow a wolf to prowl at your back while you approach a cliff.”

Sebastian fumed silently while Aeryn leveled a cool grey look at her partner and then nodded, grudgingly.  They were right, but Maker she was tired of the foibles of her life interfering with Sebastian’s.  “Fine.  Let’s ask Isabela if she knows of a port we can stop in without too much delay to the trip.  Worse comes to worse, we can always travel the rest of the way to Starkhaven on foot.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _This story has been brilliantly beta'd by mille libre, up to this point. She's been such a help and a gloriously patient editor and I truly appreciate all her hard work! And too, I appreciate everyone following and commenting, especially with the irregular posting. You're wonderful readers!_


	20. Chapter 20

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Finally, off we go to Starkhaven, bar a few minor details._

“I’ll go and get our packs.”  Sebastian left the room abruptly and Aeryn sighed.

“Uh, Hawke…”

“Yeah. Meet you at the gates.”  Aeryn shot Varric a rueful smile and then followed Sebastian back to their rooms at a distance, knowing he was aware of her presence. 

He kept his back turned.  “I understand.  I do…why you will listen to him when you’ll ignore me.“

“I wasn’t ignoring you.”

“No?  If I tell you that you’ve taken too much of a chance, you push me off.  If Fenris does, you just go and take his advice.”  _Maker, he was whining.  S_ ebastian swallowed back another complaint and finished refilling his quiver.  The newly fletched crimson tipped shafts rattled as he swung the strap over his shoulder.   Aeryn stepped up close to him, and picked another of the arrows up, fanning the feather with her thumb, lost in thought for a minute before she tapped it against her hand.

“It’s not… that’s not why I changed my mind.” Sebastian looked set to argue with her and she held up her hand to bring him to a pause.  “I admit, had you not put it quite so, so _commandeering_ , I would’ve agreed with you.  By the time Fenris said something, I’d thought it through.”

“What was it then, that changed your mind?”

“I just don’t want my past to continually interrupt us.  You can’t always take out time from what’s really important to help me clear up some mess, every time I paint a target on my back.  At some point you have to commit yourself, us, to Starkhaven .  I know that and I thought we had reached that point. “

“What’s really important?”  He blinked at her.

“Yes.”

“Important , she says.  Maker, help me _.”_   He glanced to the beamed ceiling, running his hands through his hair before turning back.  “And what is it you think is more important ta me _than you_?”  Sebastian’s voice had been level when he started to speak, but the volume rose to a shout.

Aeryn’s face went carefully blank before she answered and Sebastian felt a chill pool in his stomach as he recognized her shielding herself, as if from some expected hurt.  “Well, Starkhaven, for one.”

 “Starkhaven.”  

Suddenly wanting to move, Aeryn felt pinned by the intensity of his gaze.  For once, she couldn’t read his face, only that she had triggered some deep emotion that he was barely keeping a rein on.  He stalked forward, grimly, until he saw the way she had tensed and then paused to take her hand up.  Gentle.  As careful as though he held a cracked shock bomb. 

The contrast disarmed her.

“Come with me.”  Sebastian didn’t release her hand as he reached into the pocket of his pack, and white-knuckled, clenched his other hand around something small and pulled it out.  He tugged her out to the study and towards the stairs.  She followed after him, captivated by the sudden turn and terribly curious about what was in his hand before she balked, recalling that they had errands to run, preparations to make and she couldn’t just follow him like a lamb befuddled by the charm of his voice and his pretty eyes.

“Wait.  Sebatian, _wait_.  Where are we going?”

He barely glanced at her before he answered, “We are going to Alistair’s garden and _then_ we are going back to the chapel.”

“Back to the chapel?  Love, if you’re suddenly in need of prayer, feel free.  But I have to…”

“Oh, I imagine I’m in need of all sorts of prayer if I’m ever to have a chance to understand the convoluted paths your devious, clever mind takes at the least provocation.”

Aeryn  glared up at him, then, all humor lost.  “Enough.  What are you doing?”

“Marrying you.” 

He pulled her along a few more stunned paces before she dug her heels in and yanked him around to face her.  “ _What_?”

Tension radiated between them, their fingers linked, but he answered her.  “I do not know what it will take to convince you that I love you.  That you’re the soul of me.  That if you died, _mo chridhe_ , it would cut the heart out of me and make me beg the Maker for a short life.  But I’ve half a mind that perhaps marrying you might at least make you consider it before you say something so blighted _foolish_.”

“Half a mind is _exactly_ what I was thinking!” 

Desperately, he begged, “Aeryn, please tell me that you don’t honestly believe that I would put the throne of Starkhaven in front of you.” 

“Not the throne, no, of course not.”

“Then _what?”_ When she didn’t respond, he asked “Do I not deserve some answer?”

“You didn’t start all of this until your nobles began sending you letters, until you discovered that Starkhaven was in trouble.  I know that.  You decided to help them and then you thought to come to me.  I understand that .”

“You think I left the Chantry for Starkhaven?”

“For your people.”

She said it as if it made all the difference, and perhaps, he thought, it did.  To her.  But still.  “And that you were some sort of…what…additional perk of office?”

_Is that how it sounds?_   “No.  No, Sebastian I know you love me.”

“I want Starkhaven for one reason and one reason only, Aeryn Hawke.”  He waited for her to ask, but she just stared back at him, clearly baffled as though he’d suddenly lost his mind.  “I want to fix what has gone awry there because I have a duty to the people my family has ruled for so long.  But, then I want to lay it at your feet.  I want to give you a place to build a home, find some _peace_ , and if I thought I could do that any way but to take my family’s seat back altogether and build a wall around your sister and your friends, I would do it.  I do not _want_ the power or the insidious privilege or the endless tangle of politics and maneuvering, but I will take them and bear them to make myself a man worthy of you.”  Turning, he pulled her out of the corridor. They reached the lower gallery and he flung open the door, musing aloud, "It's not what I had planned, but...it'll do." 

“For _what_? Sebastian, it's freezing out there! “

“And since when have you cared about that? “

_“Why?”_

“So that I can ask you to marry me when we are not covered in blood or on the run for our lives or in the middle of the Maker blessed  _street_!"  He let go her hand.  He would not drag her about like a child. Not to this.

_Bloody Void, he was serious_.  Aeryn caught his sleeve, stopping him.  “Hold up a minute.”  Deliberately pushing away the panic his declaration had called up, she steadied her voice and closed her hands around his, around that tiny, beautifully made box.   “Sebastian, I love you so very much.”

He tore his eyes from the gentle clasp of her hands to her face, unusually soft, her eyes like doves when she asked,  "This isn't what you planned, is it?"

"No, but...Aeryn."  Hurt and raw panic in the way he spoke her name and she pulled him to her, sliding her hands up to his shoulders to cup his jaw. 

"I will marry you, Sebastian.  Anytime you want.  We can go to Mother Beatrice right this moment, or if she won't perform the service for a heretic, Isabela can row us out to the middle of the harbor and do it.  But..."  And there she paused.   _But that’s not what I want._  Sebastian thought he saw fear cross her face before she asked, "Can...can I have _that_ , instead?  That...whatever you planned?"

"But..."

“You're only asking now because I've upset you and pushed you.   I…Would you just...ask me again, the way you meant to and hopefully not when you’re mad at me?

"I mean it _now_ , Aeryn.  It's not a...a whim."

The solemnity slid from her face, replaced with her crooked smile.  "I see that.  You’ve got this box that I would very much like to open and everything and I’ll say yes, if you insist on asking me now.  But I’ve heard you, Sebastian.”  There was a question on the tip of his tongue and the high arch of his brow and she answered it.  “I don’t sleep so soundly that I wouldn’t hear you ask me to marry you, you know.”

“Oh.”

“You weren’t asking me for real, I know.  Just practicing.  And now you’re upset.  I just...I know you were waiting for something.  I don't have to know what it was, even, just that you thought it was important.“ 

He stared at her for a second before dropping his head.  The fear he’d seen a moment before made more sense to him, now.  She was asking him for this, as though it was some luxury with which he could indulge her.  Aeryn, in all their years circling each other and even in the past few months together, rarely asked him for anything.  He didn’t want to deny her, but, “It…there are some traditions, I’d like to follow.  There is…yes, there was something.  I'm afraid you might be a bit disappointed.”  He’d wanted to ask her in Starkhaven, in the gentle, early warmth of a northern spring.  Promises of a future.  Not the frozen grief of this garden built around a love lost.

"You won't disappoint me.”

And there was another thing.  He’d disappointed everyone.  His parents, his grandfather, his brothers and, certainly, Elthina.  His voice was strangled when he finally answered her.  “How can you be sure?

"I have that much faith."  Shifting, Aeryn tilted Sebastian’s austere face down to hers, ignoring the icy wind blowing in through the open door.  "Such faith in you, darling man.  I gave you my heart years ago and you’ve always treated it like nothing less than treasure, with far more care than I ever gave the poor thing.  And if you have something else in mind, then, I want that." She kissed the tip of his nose, chilly and now damp.  And his bronzed cheeks, the sharp bones of them under skin flushed with the frost around them.  “Now forgive me for being dense and let’s close the door before we catch pneumonia.”  She had snagged the little box away from him, and took a moment to tuck it securely into the breast pocket of his jerkin.

“Promise me something, first.”

“Anything.”

“Never forget your place in my heart, Aeryn.  I take my duty to Starkhaven seriously, but…you will always come first to me.” 

He had her hand clasped to his heart, in mimic of an oath sworn.  Aeryn pushed back another spurt of fear that climbed up her heart like grasping vines.  It was a lot of weight to place on someone like her, she thought.  The whole of his honor on the heft of their love.  And what did it do to him every time she questioned it?    Enough of that.  “I promise.”

The guardsman at the door bowed before them with a long suffering glance back at them as he closed the door and Sebastian nodded to the fellow as they passed before pausing to ask her, “Would you really have married me this very moment?” 

She shot him a challenge from the corner of her eye, “Shall I ask Isabela to fix up the skiff?”

Sebastian gave her his soft sweet smile.  “I think we can manage better than that.”

Chuckling, Aeryn tucked her hand into his elbow.  “Isabela’s idea of a wedding would be better that than the fol-de-rol that Mother used to dream up for me and Bethany.  Foolishly elaborate dresses and a row of maids in waiting. Horse-drawn carriages, even.  Little girls throwing rose petals hither and yon.”

“Not what you want?”  Good.  Simple was something he could work with. 

There was a pause and a sudden bleakness flashed like quicksilver across her features.  “I…never really thought much about what I wanted.”    

Sebastian turned her into an alcove and slid his fingers into the rich, soft hair behind her ear, stroking until she gave him a rueful smile.  “Think about it, then?”

Her smile turned wicked, “What?  So I can whisper it into your ear while you sleep?”  When he laughed, she laced their fingers together and pulled him along.  “C’mon.  There are people trying to kill me again.  We’d best go figure it out.”

00000

Isabela was waiting for them at the tavern, and groused over missing all the excitement.  “I should have bunked with you lot, palace guard or no.”

“Nah.  They didn’t have so much as a bent copper on them, ‘Bela.  Waste of talent.”

“I suppose.  Let’s see your map, Varric.”

He rolled it out on the table and before Aeryn could pin down the corners, Isabela was already tracing the best route.  Tapping a little inlet, with one scarlet nail, she noted, “Here.  Far enough from Kirkwall that none of you should be recognized, but not too far out of the way.  Your captain might cut up a little about pulling into port here, it’ll take him out of the lanes, but it’s a legitimate cove and there shouldn’t be any trouble.  You can stock up on supplies and get a decent night’s rest at the inn…The Gull’s Wing, I think it’s called.”  She took a swig from one of the mugs of tea Aeryn had weighted down the scroll with and then, choked, grimacing.  “Oh, Maker.  That stuff’s awful, like weeds in stagnant water.  How do you stand it?” 

Aeryn took the mug away and liberally dosed it from the honey pot on the table before handing it back.  “Better?”

Isabela sipped before begrudgingly acknowledging, “Oh, alright.  You’re off at tide, right?”

“Midnight.”

“I’ll be at the dock, then.  I’m gonna go, see if I can find out what ship your dwarves came in on.”

“Wait, Rivani.  I’m on my way to the Guild, I’ll walk with you.”  Varric slung Bianca across his shoulder.

As they left the Gnawed Noble, Herren saw them across the square and waved them over.  “I was just about to send a messenger to the palace.  Wade’s finished your order.”

The early morning was bleak, the wind driving sleet before it, and they were glad enough to forgo the walk back to enter to the shop, blisteringly warm from the heat of Wade’s roaring forge.  As she shook out her cloak, Aeryn watched Sebastian, who had slightly hunched against the piercing wind, stretch in the warmth and pull his fur-lined hood back.  There were tiny ice crystals lodged in his eyebrows and she smiled, slightly, as his gloved fingers smoothed them away.  Fenris rubbed his toes against the back of his calves, one bare foot then the other and gave a shudder that dislodged the ice from his own cloak.  They’d be glad to get back to the Marches away from the cold, she knew, though Sebastian rarely complained and Fenris only grumbled and after seven years, she knew when to ignore _that_.  She and Merrill were the only two who had enjoyed Ferelden’s fierce early winter weather. 

Herren directed Aeryn to the changing area and she paused before drawing back the curtain.  Fenris had finally accepted a new set of armor, only slightly modified from the original.  The enchanted steel, turned solidly black by some skill of Wade’s made for a less patched together look, and a deeper shine to the armor indicated a better spell resistance.  Fenris looked, as much as he ever did, pleased with the results as he turned over one gauntlet in his hands.

She held her breath, though, when Master Wade pulled the chestplate of Sebastian’s new gear out. 

Confused, Sebastian reached out to touch the polished surface, his fingers hesitantly.  “I thought we had agreed that the darker toned…”

From behind him came Aeryn’s low voice.  “I asked him to make this set.  We have the other, too, but…this is princely.”  She’d come back a few days after they’d ordered the armor, to see if this couldn’t be made as well.  After some consideration she’d decided it had been wrong of her to have Sebastian try and blend in to the background.  He might be safer, but he’d never take his place that way.   

Wade set the chestplate in his hands and Sebastian marveled at the lightness of the piece as he turned it over. 

“It’s my finest work.”  The normally effusive smith let the detail speak for itself.  The plate was gleaming with care, dragonbone glowing like a pearl and illuminating Wade’s skill.  Not brilliant white like the armor his father had given him, but a richer shade, ivory like the inside of a shell.  It was gilded along the edges, but burnished to a deep gleam rather than a bright shine.  The fishmail surcoat was of the same material, lighter by far than his old set and a bit shorter, coming only to midthigh.  He would not shine like the Maker’s Light in this, but there was no doubt that eyes would still be drawn to him, that the light would reflect. 

Aeryn was waiting.  Stock still as she leaned against the wall and her eyes fixed on his face.  If they’d been alone, he thought she’d be gnawing that oft abused lower lip, nervously.  “If you don’t like it…as I said, we have the other.  But prince or not, beloved, you aren’t meant for shadows.” 

He swallowed, nodding.  Putting this on, Sebastian realized, would be shedding the last of his days of the Chantry.  The belt that girded his waist would bear no seal of Andraste, no seal at all unless he won the throne of Starkhaven and he could affix the Vael seal in its place.  And his last chance of pleasing his father would pass, too, as Sebastian stepped into an arena that Simeon Vael had sworn his youngest son would never claim.  Quietly, he said, “Let me see how it looks, then.”

In the privacy of the curtained dressing area, Aeryn shucked her own clothes, having left off the gear she normally wore.  The new set was drakeskin, dyed sooty grey, and she was rather amazed at the fluid drape that Wade had achieved on the undershirt and the trousers.  The brigandine with its sharkskin lined hood was black with grey stitching, the belts, bracers and scabbards figured in buffed silverite.  Even the boots were a perfect match, and for once the built in sheathes wouldn’t chafe her ankles on a long hike.  She emerged, checking her flexibility, with a well-pleased smile.  “Nicely done, Master Wade.  Worth every sovereign.”

Fenris eyed her rig-out with a nod.  “It suits you, Hawke.”  She gave him an elegant bow and then took a turn around him.  Fenris had allowed the mastersmith to tone down the spikes of his pauldrons and to smooth the jagged lines of his armor’s build.   Her partner matched her, almost, with her stitching echoing his lyrium.  The two of them, flanking Sebastian in his pearl and burnished gold, would make a striking set.

“This other set is exactly the same, only…”

“Other set?”

“Well, you and the prince are together?  What you requested is fine for your sort of work, Lady Hawke, but you’ll need something showier for state occasions.”  Wade opened the other chest he’d brought out while she changed and revealed a set of rich brown leathers, cut exactly like the ones she was wearing, but figured in gold and with small plates and insets of the pearlized dragonbone.  She’d gleam at Sebastian’s side. 

Aeryn turned, intending to appeal to Wade’s business partner’s better sense, “Herren…”

The shopkeeper waved his hand dismissingly, “No, no.  It’s Wade’s decision.  He won’t take no for an answer.”  Aeryn glanced at Fenris who shrugged.

“Answer to what?”  Sebastian’s quiet voice asked from the corner and Aeryn spun to look him over. 

It was a leaner look.  The plate Wade had designed was far less bulky in profile, but fine-tuned to Sebastian’s stance, it would provide as much protection.  The leather had a richer, chocolate tone and suited his dark skin.  The gold and pearl set off the auburn in his hair and made his eyes blaze.  Even in the shop, dim as it was with the grey day outside, he was eyecatching. 

“Our armorer has taken it upon himself to make us a match,” she explained as her gaze drifted up from his boots to his eyes.  Sebastian felt the hair on the back of his neck rise with the intensity of her observation before Aeryn pulled out the jerkin and Sebastian saw what she meant.  Leathers meant for royalty.  

“It looks fine, _leannan_.  Will you wear it, then?”  He was startled to find himself avidly curious but she just shrugged.

“Perhaps.  For now, these will do.”  Aeryn tucked the second set away and unlashed the coinpurse from her belt.  “Let’s settle up then, Herren.”

 

00000

 

Sebastian and Aeryn stopped by the guest wing to discuss the events of the morning with Robard and Cleve.

 “Glad to see you hale.” Cleve clapped Aeryn across the shoulders and she had to catch herself, so as not to stumble from his enthusiasm.  “Dwarves can be formidable.  Had a troop of mercs come through Cleve not long after the Fereldan’s kicked Orlais out.  Took a good two years to get ‘em routed out, properly.”

“It was an interesting way to start the day,” she agreed as they took out the map to show the planned route that would swing them through the Vimmarks and then the Marches. 

“Don’t see why you can’t just wait and see.  Like as not, they won’t try it again.”

 Robard shook his head.  “No.  I’d rather not take the chance that you are being hunted.  Unnecessary complication to something that’s already a snarl.  I’ll talk to my captain, see if we can pull into this port.  I take it you’ll still be avoiding Kirkwall?”

“At all costs, yes.”  Aeryn said shortly.  He nodded, taking the hint that she didn’t care to discuss it further and called for his secretary.  Lady Theresè joined them, just as they were about to leave and invited them into the small, well-appointed chamber she’d claimed as a sitting room. 

“If I could have a word with the both of you?” 

“Of course.”  Sebastian waited until the ladies were seated and then sat beside Aeryn on the small damask covered chaise.  The older woman poured them a cup of tea and offered them the plate of cakes and fussed so much that Aeryn was rather forcibly reminded of Theresè’s vapid sister, Dulci de Launcet.  It surprised her, as Theresè had struck Aeryn as far more sensible.

They had been served and a discussion of the weather had been wrung out and silence crept in.  Sebastian could feel Aeryn tensing beside him, as if she were a bowstring being pulled too tight and broke the silence.  “You said you needed a word, my lady?”

With a tiny sigh, she nodded, bowing her dark hair and showing a streak of silver that started at her temple and wound through.  “There is only one thing, Prince Sebastian.”  Therese’s mouth thinned for a moment, as if she truly did not want to say what she was thinking and they waited for her to continue.  “The two of you…I understand you have been… _lovers_ , here in Ferelden?”

“Yes, my lady, though I’m not sure what concern it is of yours.”  Sebastian’s eyebrows were high and his voice had dropped in that way that promised a great deal of trouble for the person before him and Aeryn felt a little numb thud at her heart.  _Oh, flames._  

Theresè lifted her hands as if to ward off any anticipated attack.  “Please do not think I disapprove.  You are adults, your situation was uncertain, and trust me, I was also young, though you might not know to look at me, now.  But, you had a certain reputation once, Your Highness.  And, Lady Hawke, yours is of a different sort, but people do not know you except by what stories they have heard.  More than a few of them are risqué.”  Apologetically, she continued.  “And I have a reputation as well, as a matron of the nobility.  I…would be expected, in normal situations to maintain…proprieties.”

Aeryn watched a stormcloud form in the wrinkle on Sebastian’s brow and saw Therese’s eyes get a bit wide and interrupted what might have devolved into a flurry of apologetic evasions.  “Please, Lady Theresè, just say what you mean.”

 “You are not married.  And you have an obligation, once you are, to produce a child that has no stain on its parentage.  While we are living together aboard ship and perhaps later once we are in the Marches and you are under my husband’s purview, I cannot condone your sharing a bed.”

Sebastian opened his mouth to rebuke her for stepping outside her bounds, as Aeryn, imperceptibly to anyone but him, stiffened, her whole self shifting away from her normal inclination to draw close.  But then he bit his tongue.  To argue with Theresè would be to possibly affirm that he hadn’t changed from the rash youth he’d been.  Not really, that he was still bound by the rule of his flesh.   That there was only the physical bond between him and Aeryn and that to deny it for any length might see it wither.  He snapped his mouth shut.  “I see.”

Aeryn’s voice was cool and her face composed.   He recognized the mask she’d often shown to the more harmless of Kirkwall’s nobility when she answered, “If you think it appropriate, my lady.  Of course.  What are a couple of weeks, less than that if the weather and our luck hold?” 

“Now, please.  Once you are away from me and the household I have responsibility over I can say to anyone who asks that while you were under my aegis you behaved with utmost propriety, no matter what.  That will carry some weight.  I have…been known to help in such situations.”  She held her fingers, knotted a little with age out to him.  “If I have overstepped…”

Sebastian found his voice again and took her hand to make a seated bow over it, despite the hollow pit forming in his stomach.  “No. Lady Theresè, we appreciate your advice.  It seems sound.  As Aeryn says, of course.  It is only a matter of weeks.” 

The older woman smiled gently, small creases around her mouth gathering as if it were something she did often, when she wasn’t having to play a part she clearly found distasteful.  “Thank you for listening, Your Highness.  Lady Hawke.  I think it will be best, in the long run.  Some of our noble customs are odd and convoluted, I know.   But appearances matter.”

Aeryn nodded.  “So I have said, more than once. Now, if you’ll both excuse me, I need to see to a few matters before we disembark on the high tide.”

“Aeryn…”  Sebastian looked worriedly to her and she gave him a corner of her crooked smile and patted his arm, ignoring his clenched hand.  Her fingers felt cool and he had to stop himself from taking her hands and chafing their normal warmth back into them.

“Just a few last minute things.”  She slipped out of the door and by the time Sebastian had taken leave himself and followed, Aeryn had disappeared. 

0000

She mentally rebuked herself as she walked down the hall.  Sebastian would take her leaving that way personally, Aeryn knew, but she needed a minute to pull herself together, for his sake.  And too, between this morning and now this, she had a decision to make.  But she had to find Merrill, first.

The elf was walking the circular path of the inner garden, checking on the plantings she had made.  Aeryn paused as she watched Merrill, big eyes closed and her face lifted to the weak sun that had finally broken through the clouds.  “Hullo, Hawke.”

“Hey.”

“I’m going to miss you sneaking up on me.”  Merrill smiled sadly over at her friend. 

“And I’ll miss doing it.”  Aeryn came up beside her.  “How much time would you need to get ready for that favor I asked you for?”

Merrill gave her a sly little smile.  “None at all.  I’ve been waiting for you to ask again.”

That startled Aeryn and the clear surprise on her face made Merrill laugh.  “Oh, Hawke.  You’re nothing if not persistent.  I figured I’d just get everything ready and cut down on the deciding.  I can’t give you a Dalish pattern.  But…something small.  For you, Hawke, I will.”  She pulled Aeryn along behind her.  “Come on then.”

In her room, Merrill had a low table, a lap desk really, set up on a pair of level stones in front of her hearth.  She cleared a few books from the surface and then brought a small box, intricately carved, up from the depths of the trunk at the foot of her bed.  “I found this in a little shop in the alienage here.  It’s quite nice, there, much better than Kirkwall.  Apparently, some Dalish passing through traded it for supplies.  I don’t know the clan…I’d try and return it, otherwise.  But maybe…maybe I should keep it.  What do you think?”

Aeryn curled up on the rug, opposite to Merrill kneeling on the other side.  “If it found its way to you, why shouldn’t you keep it?”

Merrill set her tools up on the green cloth she’d laid out, talking to the small instrument she held in her hand.  “Were you looking for me?  Maybe.”   She pulled out a single bottle of ink, dark and thick in the glass.  “Now, then.  If we were doing _vallaslin_ , we’d have to bleed you a bit first, and there are rituals involved but I can’t do that, you know.”

“Right.”  Aeryn pulled a little slip of paper out and showed it to Merrill, who smiled. 

“Ooh.  I like that.  Did you draw it?”

“No.  Sebastian…when he’s got a quill in hand, he almost always doodles one or two.”

“And...”  Merrill rummaged through the ink vials.  “Yes, I have the inks. Now, where?”

Aeryn held out her left hand.  “Right here.”

Merrill’s eyes flew wide.  “Oh.  Oh, that’s important.  Right?  For humans?”

She could feel a flush burning across her cheeks, but Aeryn nodded.  “Well.  Yes.  Pretty important.”

“It’s going to hurt, you know.  There on the bone.”  She picked Aeryn’s hand up and turned it over, contemplating the little design.  Finally, she poured a bit of ink into one small glass bowl and picked up the stylus.  “Ready?”

“Now as ever.”

She closed her eyes when Merrill set the stylus to her skin, thin across the bone and with a whisper of a spell and a flush of mana, started tapping.  

A breath, two. 

 All it took to draw the pain down and swallow around the burn.  Aeryn had forgotten the sharp immediacy of the needle, the almost hollow sound of the striker against the handle of the stylus. Heat on her back from the fire through the thin wool of her tunic and the scent of herbs and spice from the bundle of greenery Merrill had tossed into the hearth.  The thick woolen rug beneath her backside.  All of it faded for the quicksilver flashing  _stab stab stab_  of the little bone needle.

A few moments later, the tapping ceased though the burn lingered and she blinked.  Merrill’s eyes, wide and luminous, were watching her avidly.

Aeryn asked, glancing down at her finger, “Is something wrong?

“No.  Oh, no.  I was just thinking.”  Merrill carefully daubed away the excess ink with a scrap of lint and paused to consider her work.

“Thinking what?” 

“How very odd it is that you can know someone for seven years, fight beside them, see them hurt and bleed and yet not know something so interesting about them.”  Merrill started back up, seemingly unsurprised that Aeryn was still as stone beneath her own, slim steady hands.  

A few taps later and Aeryn answered, half breathless, “It’s just another weapon, Merrill.”

"Though doesn't it explain a thing or two?"

00000 

It was long after dusk when Sebastian finally found her, perched on the low wall of the courtyard besides their page, Harry, overseeing the loading of gear into the handcarts.  The lad was hanging on every word as she spoke to him in her low tones.  “…and then, it was just a matter of figuring out how to gather enough funds to buy into the expedition.  Mostly, running errands for various people.  But it got exciting now and again. A few blood mages, handful of bandit hordes.  Even had to do up a dragon.  Little one, though, nothing like the two high dragons your uncle fought during the Blight.”

_And of course, never mind the high dragon she fought and nearly lost an arm to, a few years later._ Sebastian shook his head.  “Here you are.” 

“Time to go.  Told you I had things to get ready.”  Her voice was light, but that persistent little stress line was clear between her eyes and Sebastian reached out, instinctively to smooth it out.  “Anything else you need me to pack?”

“Everything I have of note is in those three trunks, beyond my bow and quivers.”  

“Travel light, travel fast.”  She started to grin up at him, but stopped seeing the concern drawing lines around his eyes.  _Ah, better fix that._ “Run on then, Harry.”

He waited until the boy was a few paces away before turning back to her, ” _Leannan_ …”

She pulled him down to sit beside her, and curved into him with an arm around his lean waist. He all but slumped against her in relief. 

“Sebastian, you look like you’re being led to the gallows.  I’m not going to cut up about it.”

“Can I, then?” 

She kissed away the pout he would adamantly deny.  “No.  We shall be a shining example of restraint and give Lady Theresè a good report.”  Then with a sigh, she reminded them both, “It’s only two weeks.”  

He nodded, kissing her back and resisting the urge to pull her into his lap, here in the damp, icy courtyard.  “I…will you be alright? Alone?”

“I’ll manage.  I did for years, if you’ll recall.” 

There was something cool in that and he recognized her need to reassert her own ability to cope, but, “I dinna want you to _manage_ , I want to be there for you if you’ve need of me.  As I promised I would be.”

Relenting, Aeryn stroked her thumb along his cheekbone, “You’ll just be down the passage, Sebastian.  I can find you, even in the dark.”

“You’re truly not upset?” 

“She wasn’t calling me a whore, love, she was trying to give us a hand in an area that she well knows shouldn’t be her business, but is.  I understand.” 

“She might have been calling _me_ a whore, though.” He’d laid his forehead against hers and it was a bare whisper that escaped him.

“Hey, now.  Don’t do that.”  She fixed him with a pale gaze until he nodded.  “There’s no good word for it, but it was long ago and far away.  And if the rest of Starkhaven doesn’t know it yet, they will soon.”

 There was a spark of steel in the way Aeryn spoke, but he was well aware it was meant for his family and not for him.  He caught her hand and then, when she winced, glanced down at her slim fingers.  She was wearing a small bandage under her glove. 

“Now what have you done?”

Aeryn only just kept herself from snatching her hand back.  “I’ll show you later.”

Baffled out of his melancholy, he asked, “Show me?  You’ve hurt yourself, Aeryn.  Where’s Bethany?”

“It’s nothing like that and I’ll show you once we’re on the boat.  The wrap has to stay on for now.”  Merrill had told her to keep it covered for the first few hours and that any healing or elfroot would ruin the mark, probably erase it altogether.  Aeryn didn’t expect to have to fight while they were on the boat, bar a pirate boarding, so she’d have plenty of time for the tiny tattoo to heal normally.

Sebastian cradled the clearly injured hand in his, for a moment, before shaking his head. “I don’t understand.”

“You’ll see.  I hope.”  Actually, now that she’d gone and done it, Aeryn wasn’t sure at all he’d like it.  Which was why she’d made sure and had Merrill write down a healing spell that would definitely erase the ink.

“Aeryn.”  He put a bit of a snap in his tone, but this time she just grinned at him.

“Trust me?”

And so, he had to back down.  “Of course.”

She pushed herself off the wall, brushing stonedust from her arse.  “C’mon.  Harry was telling me that Alistair wanted to take our leave in private.  Had a packet of letters, too.”  And she had a thought.  _Two bloody weeks.  Sodding Void._

They were nearly to Alistair's study when Aeryn glanced surreptitiously around them and then pulled away to disappear behind a tapestry depicting Dane fighting off a horde of werewolves.  Intrigued, Sebastian followed her into a tiny room, and startled when she reappeared to shut the door. 

Sebastian stumbled in the sudden dark, only to have her pressed up against him, forcing him against a stone wall at his back.  "What...?"

"Found this when Macie and I were sneaking around looking for boltholes."  Her hand threaded into his hair.  "Our room's still being cleaned and if I can't have you again until we dock..." but he'd followed this particular path of thought and stopped her with his mouth, hard against hers.

Aeryn’s mouth was warm and sweet and her clever hands already had his laces half undone.  He cupped her, the heated apex of her thighs, in his own hand and she ground against his palm.  "We don't...oh, have a lot of time, love.  Give me something to dream about."

Aeryn closed her fingers around Sebastian's cock, working the shaft gently as he swelled into her hand. 

He trailed a hot line down her throat, to suck at her pulse, grateful that she'd unbuckled her new armor that far, at least.  In the dark, he wasn’t sure he could have managed the new latches.  Her scent, almonds and steel, flooded his nose and he breathed deeply.

In strong fingers, he grabbed a fistful of leather to tug her trousers, smalls and all far enough to thrust a thigh between her lithe legs, working the buttery leather farther down, banging his shoulder against the shelf next to him.  "This would be easier if you wore skirts." He complained when she pulled away long enough to yank off one boot and the pantleg, but then he felt her breath, hot on his thigh just before she sucked him in, her tongue swirling lovingly around the crown of his cock.  Once, twice before she pulled off. 

"Or maybe if you weren't so bloody big?"

He drew her back to her feet. "Dinna recall you complaining about that, before."  He grinned into the dark when she smacked his chest for the weak sallie before sliding his fingers into her soaking folds with a groan, "Maker, you're wet."  He pressed his palm against the hard nub and she moaned into his jerkin, hips writhing. The idea, being without her scent surrounding him, the seasweet flavor, without the sounds of her pleasure made him suddenly desperate and he dragged her back to taste her, to feel Aeryn's hot, slick tongue lick into his mouth and to worry her plump lower lip with his sharp teeth, trying to fix each memory.  
  
Hitching her leg over his hip, Aeryn licked a stripe up his jaw when he shifted his hands to lift her, pinning her gently against the rough stone.  "Want you.  Sebastian, now."  She nipped his earlobe and he yelped as his hips involuntarily thrust, hilting in her, Short, sharp nails dug into his scalp.  "Yessss, oh, holy.... _harder._ "  She begged into his ear and his body obeyed the plea, hips rolling to meet hers.

"So good.  You feel....Maker, Aeryn, so good."

 Sebastian was already shaking, his thighs straining with the odd angle, but Aeryn was so close it didn't matter.  She buried her shriek in his neck as she came and he followed as her body dragged him along in a spasm of pleasure.  Not enough, not nearly enough.  But all they had for now.

He dropped kisses on the bowed crown of her head.  "I'm going to go mad, the idea of being without you.  I dinna know where all my discipline's gone.  I'm goin' to be a wreck by th' time we dock."

She chuckled weakly.  "Well, at least you'll have a bit of decent privacy.  Fenris and Varric ought to be sympathetic.  I'm sharing the cabin with my sister."

"I dinna think I want to share m' private dreams of you with Varric of all people,  _leannan_.  He's like to publish them."

Sighing, Aeryn felt his cock twitch and soften and shifted against him.  They needed to straighten up, soon and go.  "'Erotic Musings of a Prince'?"  I don't know.  It'd probably be a best seller."

"Mine and mine alone, my dreams of you.  Too sacred to share."

00000

In Alistair’s private study, they shared a glass of the Fereldan cider that he’d promised to keep them supplied in once they settled.  “I’m going to miss your little band.  Kept things exciting around here.  And I am eternally thankful for your timely arrival, Hawke. ”

“Happy to have been of service, Alistair.  I like to earn my keep.  You’ll have excitement of your own in a handful of months, anyway.  Enjoy the peace while it lasts.”  Aeryn toasted Dierdre, who smiled and took a tiny sip in return. 

“You’re probably right.  Count m’blessings, I suppose.”  The king gave her a cheeky smile but it faded.  After a moment, he raised his glass to Sebastian.  “To the success of your endeavors and the friendship of our lands in times to come.  You can count on Ferelden in future days, Prince Vael.”

“I’m grateful to you, King Alistair.  I hope I am in a position soon, to return the promise.”  They clasped hands, firmly.   

Outside, the bells of the chapel chimed the hour, calling ten.  “That’s our summons, I’m afraid.”  Aeryn gave the King and Queen of Ferelden the best of her curtsies.  She’d no longer call herself Fereldan, after they left, she’d decided.  She wasn’t after all, it was no longer home, even in her heart.  “We should be on the way to the harbor, soon.” 

Alistair handed her a packet.  “Letters from Amaranthine, I’m told,” as Aeryn flicked through them before she tucked them into her belt pouch to read later.  Nothing so urgent that it couldn’t be read on the boat.  She couldn’t allow any other business to get in the way.

000000

Materializing from the shadows beside her, Isabela whistled low.  “Maker, look at her.  Hawke, you’ll be sailing in style, lucky girl.”

It looked like the other boats in the harbor to Aeryn.  Perhaps a bit more decorative than some with its red sails and the gilded carvings around the portholes and along the railings.  “She looks good?”

“Yes, that’s what I’m saying.”  The pirate rolled her eyes as she wandered off to get a closer look at the ship’s caulking.

Their gear had been stowed away by Robard’s quick deckhands and there were only the last farewells to make.  Isabela and Merrill stood on the pier, Isabela with a casual cant to her hip as she looked over the moonlit water and Merrill’s large hazel eyes about to spill over as the freshening breeze picked up and the ship bobbed beside them.

Aeryn slid her arm around the slim elf and squeezed.  “Be good to yourself, alright.  Let us hear from you.  Varric gave you and ‘Bela the contacts, right?” 

Merrill nodded and snuggled close for a minute taking a deep breath and smelling the elfroot, from the salve Hawke was always needing to bind up wounds.  How many times had Hawke gladly set out to the Wounded Coast with her to hunt down new sources of the useful plant, eager to be away from the city?  “He did.  I’ll try.”

“Especially if you decide to…well.  You know. I need to know how that goes, alright?”  Merrill still hadn’t mentioned the thought of joining the Grey Wardens to anyone else, but Aeryn wanted to be sure that her friend would write about what she could.  Surely Meridan would allow that?

“I will, Hawke.”

Aeryn reached out and tugged one of the elf’s dark lovelocks, fondly, only to find herself pulled into Isabela’s embrace with a squeak. 

Isabela laid a solid kiss on Aeryn’s lips.  A perfectly friendly kiss.  With only the teensiest hint of tongue.  Aeryn thumped her on the shoulder, but was chortling against her mouth.  It reminded the pirate of nights…fuck, how long ago now?  Years.

“Ahem.  Captain.”  Sebastian coughed behind them and Isabela grinned wickedly at him as she released her friend. 

“Just wanted to remind her of what she was missing out on, going all respectable.” 

With a disparaging shake of his head, Sebastian tucked Aeryn’s hand into his elbow as she unabashedly returned Isabela’s grin. 

“We’ll see you soon, though?”  Aeryn smoothed her lipstain with a thumb, chuckling still.

“Sometime after First Day, if the weather cooperates.  I’ll take a barge up the Minanter to Starkhaven unless I hear differently from you.”  Isabela agreed.

“Alright.”  The others took their leave, as well.  Fenris nodding politely to Merrill and then gallantly kissing Isabela’s hand. 

Aeryn turned slightly to give them a moment of privacy when she saw Isabela’s eyes go a bit too bright as the pirate stroked her dark, freckled hand through Fenris’ pale hair, pushing his bangs off his forehead.  He whispered something to her, in a low rumbling tone that Aeryn had never heard him use.  She did try hard not to eavesdrop on her friends.

Varric joined her at the rail, swinging his pack down to the deck, grumpily. "I couldn't get a straight word out of the Guild, Hawke.  I'm sorry.  I tried to get a line to a few of my old friends.  I might have something once we get back to the Marches."

Aeryn gave him a shrug.  "Won't be the first time we marched in to action, blind.  We'll manage."

"I suppose.  Makes a fellow feel kind of useless, though."

"Never that, Varric.  We'd be lost without you and Bianca."

He reached up and clasped the hand she'd set on his shoulder, giving it a squeeze.  He made a note of the bandage, too, but he'd helped Daisy find the tattoo kit and didn't need to ask.  "So, I hear that Prince Charming and Broody and I are sharing a cabin."

"Yup."

 “That okay with you?”

She arched an eyebrow at him, “Do you think it would have happened if it hadn’t been?”

He smirked back, “You do tend to get your way, even if you have to show people the right point.”

“There are ways and ways of dealing with the nobility, Varric and you taught me half of them.  He needs the good will of Robard and Theresè and this is one of the ways to earn it.  We’ll be good.”

Bethany was watching the to and fro of the sailors, with some apprehension and Aeryn thudded Varric on his broad shoulder and slid over to wrap her arm around her sister’s waist.  “Alright, then, Beth?”

“I…I hadn’t realized how much I _missed_ Ferelden.  And…well.  It would be easier for you, if I stayed.  Wouldn’t it?”

Flatly, Aeryn answered her, “No.”

“Aeryn…”

“It _wouldn’t_ be easier.  I’d be worried out of my mind.”

Bethany side-eyed her sister, “You’d planned to leave me in Kirkwall.”

Aeryn nodded, her gaze out on the harbor.  “You’re right.  You’d made your decision.  I was…reasonably certain that Cullen wouldn’t let anything untoward happen to you without a fight.  But you’d be on your own here, even with Isabela and Merrill and the decent laws that Alistair’s put in place.”  She swallowed hard and then asked, “Do you want to stay, Bethany?  I’ll…understand if you don’t want to go anywhere near the Marches.  Especially if you don’t want to take a chance on fighting with us.”

Snorting, Bethany shook her head.  “You think I‘d be any less worried than you?  You run into brawls at the drop of a hat.  I’d be _terrified_ to think of you out there with no one to drown you in healing potions.”

“You know, I do _try_ not to get hurt.”

“You’re really bad at it, then.”

“She is, at that.”  Sebastian and Fenris had padded up behind them, and Sebastian reached out to wrap his arms around Aeryn from behind.  She sank back against him and reached up to curl her fingers into the hair at the nape of his neck.   Fenris gave Bethany one of his half-smiles and they waved down to the small dockside crowd, Isabela  cat-calling and Merrill with tears spilling down her pale cheeks.

“I’ll do better.  For the two of you.” 

He squeezed his arms tighter and kissed the back of her head as the ship lurched away from the dockside. 

A thought seemed to occur to Isabela just as the red sails caught the evening wind and left the mooring behind and she reached up to check her ears.  Her fingers closed around a bare left lobe.  "You fucking little  _thief!"_

Laughing, Aeryn fished the earring out of her pocket and held it out, following the rail down to keep Isabela in sight. The gold ornament gleamed under the torches that lined the pier, rapidly sliding away. "Oh, c'mon 'Bela!  For old times' sake!"

"You're going to pay for that!"  But the Rivani was fighting back a laugh, herself.  "Throw it back, Hawke!"

"Nope.  Come after us and get it, pirate!  Forfeit for the kiss!" 

Isabela shrieked, realizing that the ship had sailed too far from the dock to catch.  "I am going to hunt you down, you light-fingered, blighted, cocksucking kleptomaniac!"

"I know!  That's why I did it!"  Aeryn tucked it safely back into her cleavage.  "See you in the spring!"  She was leaning far out over the aft rail to catch the last sight of Isabela casting a lewd gesture and Sebastian caught her 'round the waist.

He whispered into her ear, feeling her tremble against him. Her bravado had crumpled, now that no one could see but him.   "You'll see her again,  _mo chridhe_."

Aeryn threaded her fingers into his and whispered the words she'd shouted as Ferelden slipped away in the dark.  "I know.  That's why I did it."

 


	21. Chapter 21

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _On the way back to the Marches, huzzah. Endless thanks to jillyfae for her beta and general good counsel! Thanks so much!_

They settled back into shipboard life fairly quickly, though the situation was drastically different.

No more informal meals with the crew up on the deck in the sun. Now, their meals were served in the ship’s tiny jewel box of a dining room.  Robard gave pride of place to the ship’s captain, but Jans was a taciturn man and it was left to the Starkhaven nobles to make conversation with Aeryn, Sebastian and the rest of the travelling companions. Most often the conversation turned to Starkhaven itself; the people that they would be expected to know and the strategic outlying villages that would be most useful in their attempt to bend public sentiment.  

The short winter days were spent in a mix of attempts to keep in fighting trim above decks .  When the weather was too grim, they gathered below decks with cards or, in Sebastian and Fenris’ case, the chess board.  Cleve occasionally played the winner of those matches, just for a bit of variety.  

There was a small library in the study and Aeryn and Fenris delved back into their lessons, with him giving her a refresher course in the Tevene that would be heard more frequently, closer to the Imperium, while Fenris read to her.  Sebastian looked in on them often; their two heads, dark and light mingling as they bent over a book to puzzle out a phrase together.  They had gotten out of the habit of their regular lessons once he’d moved into the estate and Sebastian felt a touch of guilt when he saw how eagerly Fenris had taken up Aeryn’s offer to begin again.  But the ease of their comradeship seemed unstrained and he was glad enough of it.  

While Sebastian worked on the letters he meant to send out to the contacts he’d made, Aeryn and Bethany took advantage of Lady Thèrese’s presence to ferret out more details of the feminine side of Starkhaven life, where Sebastian had been little help.  It didn’t seem to Aeryn to hold much difference to Kirkwall’s upper echelons.

On a particularly lazy afternoon, they sat with Thèrese in her cabin, with a few bits of mending while she told them of Sebastian’s mother. “To be honest, my dear, the ladies of Starkhaven devote themselves to distractions and now and again they make a nod to charitable life.  Perhaps more often than elsewhere in the north, since Starkhaven has a long history of piety.  But, there it is.  In the past, the courtiers took their cues from the Vaels and…well, Alexandra Vael was fond of beauty and entertainment.  Now, that meant that the arts were well patronized and that poets and bards were honored guests.  But it also meant that the more serious side of things were frequently neglected, I’m afraid.”  She snipped off a stray thread, from the embroidery hoop.  “Clarice, Prince Vael’s grandmother, was interested in the merchants and it was under her that the city marketplace expanded.”

Aeryn supposed she should be concerned as to what was expected of the Lady of Starkhaven, but she was far more curious about Alexandra Vael.  Sebastian rarely spoke of his mother, even less often than of his father.  Only to say she had been lovely and rather distant.  And, Aeryn mused, clearly not interested in protecting her youngest son from his father, condemning her entirely in Aeryn’s eyes.  No wonder, she thought, Sebastian had gone searching for feminine approval elsewhere.  

Bethany, however, was asking, “Well, what about more recently?”

“Goran married,” she allowed. “A little Orlesian girl, but she died four years ago in childbirth.  The baby died, too.  Far too early to save it, even with a healer.  I suppose he’s been grieving, since.”

“You don’t know?”

“I haven’t been to Starkhaven since before the coup.” She laughed at their surprise.  “It sounds odd, but Raven’s Reach is fairly autonomous, only nominally under the aegis of Starkhaven. “  She shrugged delicately, “We trade most with Antiva and Orlais and let the city and the villages along the Minanter get along by themselves.”

There was, Aeryn thought, a certain sense of having been here before, for the cozy little scene reminded her of blizzard-bound afternoons when they were younger.  Leandra had often whiled away those times by telling her girls stories of parties and people she'd known in younger days, always keeping a careful eye on the length of their stitches.  Though as she wasn't their mother, Thèrese was not being _quite_ so obvious about it.  

“Robard went back, to see Goran crowned, but my middle daughter was about to give birth so I went to her in Nevarra.”  Thèrese  took a tangent to talk about the wide open landscape of  Nevarra, and a series of plays she had seen while there.  Picking up a spare bobbin, Aeryn caught Beth's eye.  Her sister gave her a tiny smile.  Ah, she was feeling it as well.  The only thing lacking was the rich scent of lamb stew and the knowledge that any moment Car...

Aeryn bit off the thought and refocused on what Thèrese was saying.  Whether it seemed important or not just at the moment, having these nuggets of information at her hand, ready to pull out when they were needed, would be useful to Sebastian.

“There’s a family villa in the city, but Robard gave it to his sister when she chose not to marry.  They aren’t particularly close, a letter a year is often all we hear from her.  Plus, the court at Starkhaven is, oh, very formal and occasionally treacherous.  It’s not very enjoyable, for me at least.  You may enjoy such things more?“

Aeryn shrugged, “I’ve learned to tolerate parties and I’ve always enjoyed watching people.  They have their uses, those sorts of gatherings.”

Thèrese smiled, just a little incredulously. “My, so practical an attitude.  I must say, Lady Hawke, you do continue to surprise.”

“How so?”  

“Dulci swore you were a dangerous sort and rather violent, if helpful in a pinch, but I’ve never seen anything but the best of behavior from you.  I’d swear that you both were raised in noble circles, with your manners and your parlor skills.”  

Bethany spoke up, “Our mother didn’t see any reason we couldn’t learn manners, Lady Thèrese, no matter where we were raised.”

“Well, you’re both a testament to her, then.  She’d be proud, I’d think.”

“That’s...kind of you.”  Aeryn decided to steer the conversation back to less tender ground, “You said you had children, my lady?”

A certain glint in the older woman’s dark eye told Aeryn that she wasn’t fooled, but Thèrese obliged her anyway, “Oh, yes.  Six, two boys and four girls. I tend to spend my time travelling among them and visiting the grandchildren.  I only came to Ferelden with Robard because I had met you the once.  And Isolde needed a visit from a friend.  She hasn’t left Redcliffe since the King took the throne.  Bad blood there, I’m afraid.”

Aeryn listened while Bethany asked politely about Redcliffe, absently winding pale orchid embroidery silk around the bobbin.  Self-absorbed nobles it seemed, even the well-meaning ones, were the same everywhere.   _Ah, that’s not fair._  If Raven’s Reach is fair sized and they have their own troubles and family to bother with, then why fool with a city you don’t even like?   _How much would you have bothered with Kirkwall, given the choice?_

 

00000

 

Four days out to sea and the mark on Aeryn’s finger was healed  enough to finally show Sebastian.

If she could just find him, that was. Aeryn smiled inwardly.   Usual it was Sebastian who had to come looking for her.  She wasn’t used to him simply roaming around on his own.  He’d always had his place.  His post at the Chantry, his chair in her library.  

He’d been strangely quiet the night before, retreating to the cabin he shared with Varric and Fenris not long after supper, instead of lingering over the wine and cards that typically followed an evening meal on the ship.  They’d decided the easiest way to deal with their predicament was to limit their time alone so Aeryn hadn’t gone to check on him, though her eyes had lingered on the door after he left and she’d lost a hand of Diamondback  quite spectacularly.

Now, though…it was still early, but they were usually among the first to rise.  Pushing aside the bowl of porridge she’d been toying with, Aeryn went looking for her errant prince.  

A pause outside their cabin told her that Varric, at least, was still sound asleep.  His snores rumbled even through the door. She stuck her head back into the tiny study, neatly appointed with a small shelf of books and a table and several comfortable chairs, but Sebastian wasn’t there either.  He was probably still asleep, she told herself, but the nagging concern didn’t leave her.

The weather above decks had looked damp and uninviting when she’d stuck her head up to see if she could spot him earlier. Aeryn doubted he’d have his bow out in such a climate without a decent reason, but she went up the ladder anyway.  Besides being wet, the air heavy with mist and salt, it was frigid. Even so, she climbed up the ladder determined to stretch her legs.  She jogged down the port side and did a few back bends on the broad open deck by the aft rail.  She turned up the starboard rail and...  

And there he was, on his knees, nearly hidden in between a few lashed crates, which explained why she hadn’t seen him earlier.  Aeryn pulled up, considering.  His head was bowed.  He didn’t look particularly meditative, but his lips were moving.  She hesitated to disturb him, but when he paused she crept closer.  The sails flapping in the whistling wind and the waves slapping against the ship’s siding covered any noise she might make.  

She recognized the prayer, now, catching a word here and there as it was blown from his lips on the wind.  The words spoken for the dead, hoping to speed them to the Maker’s side.   _Oh._  Silently, she curled up on a crate and waited for him to finish, frowning.  His hair was damp with mist, a rivulet of collected water running down his collar.  He’d been here a while.  His eyes were closed, the long lashes brushing against his cheeks, and she took note of the dark circles that indicated he hadn’t slept at all.

Minutes passed.  Sebastian’s long fingers gripped the railing, and his knuckles were white.  He didn’t seem to be gaining much peace from his prayer.  

He finished, all but the final words, and the lack of them hung in the air like a broken bridge.  Tension in the line of his back under the heavy dark blue wool tunic, turning even darker with the mist soaking into the unwaulked fabric.  He’d brought the thick cloak she’d bought for him in Ferelden, but it was lying ignored at his side.  When an unmistakable chill shuddered through his lean frame, Aeryn gave up on observation and picked up the cloak to drape over his shoulders.  

Sebastian jumped when the dark weight of the fur-lined cloak hit his back.  Thoroughly lost in his melancholy, he hadn’t noticed at all when Aeryn had snuck up behind him.  Her small hand patted his shoulder and, when he looked up, there was all her concern and a trace of curiosity open for him to see.

He grabbed her hand, capturing it against him.  

Aeryn shifted her stance and with her other hand began rubbing small circles, wanting to soothe, gazing out over him at the grey water; endless and choppy all the way to the equally grim horizon breathing in the salt-laden air, scented with the fish from the late catch last night.   _Tuna for lunch, likely as not.  Poor Fenris._

Finally, Aeryn spoke the end of the prayer for him, “So let it be.”

As if she’d broken a spell, he spoke.  “She would have been sixty-five, today.  Her twentieth year as Grand Cleric.”

 _Elthina._  “I’m sorry.”  

“There was to have been a celebration, though she’d not have wanted it.  We’d just started planning it all when I left.”  He paused before whispering, “She’d have been so disappointed, Aeryn.”

“Why do you think that?”

He gave her a bitter laugh.  “All I ever did was jump from this to that.  A weathervane, she called me. Changeable as the wind.  First I’m a sworn brother and then I’m a mercenary and then I’m begging to be made a brother, again, and now to be a warmonger and a prince.”  Even as he said it, Sebastian wished he could bite back the words.  Maker, he was feeling sorry for himself.  And that was worse than wallowing in grief.

Aeryn didn’t seem to mind, though.  She stood quietly behind him, her touch and presence warm on his back until, as if musing aloud, she spoke, “I don’t think she felt that way, at the end.”  

“Don’t you?”

“Well, think on this. At any time, did she ever act as though you shouldn’t spend your time helping me?  Because I never felt that way.  I never once got the impression that she wanted to see the back of me.  And I looked for it, love.  I fully expected to have her reject me, to turn me away when I came calling for you.  Never once did she do it.  She’d just smile and point you out.”  

She’d moved closer to him, shielding him from the worst of the wind and the rain that was starting to fall in earnest.  Her own oilcloth cloak repelled the water a little better.  “She wanted you to make your choice and make a life.  And I think she was good enough, that when your chosen path diverged from the Chantry, she was only happy for you.”  

“She gave me her Blessing, when I asked to be removed,” he acknowledged.

“She meant it.”

“I…loved her.”  His voice choked and Aeryn wrapped her arms around him, as if she could shield him from pain as easily as she could the bitter wind.  

“I know.  I’m so sorry.”

He took up her hand to kiss it, to thank her for her comfort.  The bandage was gone, though her glove still covered where the mark was and curiosity burrowed into his sorrow.  “Are you ever going to show me what you were hiding, then?”

“Not if you insist on standing around out in the rain.  Have you eaten?”

“No.  I thought I might fast today.  I…will not likely do so again with battles to come, but I feel I owe a last measure of respect.”

He was grateful when Aeryn didn’t chide him and merely nodded, “Alright, but come get a cup of tea, at least.”

He stood, grimacing a little at the creak in his knees.  Fit or not, he was no longer a boy and kneeling in the chill had left him stiff.  “You like the rain.”

She gave him a sideways glance as she wrapped her arm around his waist and steered him towards the hatch.  “Not when it’s making you shiver.”

One of the servants would likely have been happy to bring them a tray, but Sebastian didn’t stop Aeryn when she ducked into the galley.  She emerged, balancing a kettle, a towel, a tray and a couple of cups, and between them they managed to haul the whole of it below deck.

They settled into the study, next to the low braziers that radiated a small circle of warmth out into the room.  Aeryn poured the tea, taking a minute to fix his cup the way he liked it with just a touch of honey.  He waited for her to sit, and once she’d curled up in a chair, he arranged himself at her feet on the painted canvas rug.  While he sipped at the warming brew, she picked up the toweling and started to rub his hair dry.

He closed his eyes with a sigh.  It was still a new facet of their relationship, this indulgent side of her.  A tender fussing that was almost entirely foreign to him, but seemed to come naturally to her.  Sebastian had long since stopped denying to himself that he enjoyed it, needed it.  Obedient to the gentle pressure of her hands, he bent his neck so that she could tuck the towel in to soak up the worst of the chilling rain from the collar of his tunic.   In the quiet study, with most of the crew and passengers asleep, he could almost pretend they were back in her library, the world held at bay in those few lazy days before the Chantry fell.

She’d had been strangely reticent about the injury to her hand.  Aeryn had never been particularly shy about her scars, though she tried not to flaunt them among strangers.  She’d been wearing the little knitted lace half-mitts that she’d worn occasionally in Kirkwall, but considering Thèrese and the two noble men they were spending time with, it didn’t surprise him.   “Come on then, let me see.”

Aeryn laid the towel over the arm of the chair and smoothed his hair back into its usual neat style.  And then, deliberately, pulled her glove off and set her hand in his.  

Sebastian blinked as he turned her hand over and then back, again.  It was a tattoo, a tiny arrow, wrapped around the space between her first and second knuckle, right where a ring, _his ring_ , would sit. The wee black arrowhead met the fletching right under the knuckle. The narrow shaft etched in gold ink with a sheen to it, while the fletching was white, with crimson tips.  Just like his own arrows, the Starkhaven fletching he’d tipped in crimson to honor her, her chosen color.

It was delicate, detailed work.  

She’d marked herself, for him.  For Starkhaven.

He gaped up at her.  Aeryn was the picture of defiance, her eyes a fine shade of steel and her stubborn chin set.  As if daring Sebastian to…what, scold her over it?  She wasn’t wearing his ring.  No.  She’d simply written him on her skin, instead.

“Are you going to say something?”

“I love you.”  

“Maker, I hope so. Considering it itches like sodding rashvine, I’d hate to think I’d done it for a casual fling.  Are you going to tell me I shouldn’t have?”

There were those who would say he should, but…“No.  Holy Andraste forgive me, but the idea that you’re marked for life by …something that is very much mine…is _stirring_.”  

Aeryn let her lips curve, just a little at the blaze in the depths of his eyes. “Is it?”

“Oh, yes.” He laced her fingers with his as he turned, up onto his knees.  “I should show my appreciation.” He kept his eyes on hers as he kissed her fingers.  

“Yes, you should.”

“Didn’t it hurt, though?” He ran the tip of his tongue around the knuckle.  

The skin was still sensitive and she snatched a breath as he sucked the end of her finger between his lips.   _Maker, he has the softest lips_.  She let her eyes drift closed, as he trailed up her palm and his unshaven chin scraped, running shivers down her spine.

“Not really.”

“Why did you do it, _à ruin_?” He whispered against the hollow of her wrist, nuzzling and sparking a curl of warmth low in her belly.  She stretched and slid her calf around his waist, drawing him closer.

“Oh, I’ve been considering it for a while.  Opportunity finally came up.”  Sebastian had flicked open the small shell buttons that closed the cuff of her tunic and Aeryn laid her other hand against his cheek, impeding his progress.  “Love of mine, which of us do you suppose has the best impulse control, hmm?”

“That’s an odd…Ah.” There was more than a trace of smoke in her eyes.  With a sigh, he carefully rebuttoned her sleeve.  “Sorry, _leannan_.  Found myself carried away.”

“Well, if you can think of a private place to do so, carry me away all you’d like.”  Her dimple flashed and he kissed her temple.  

“I would in a moment.”

“But we promised to be good,” her hand smoothed away the lines that his grief had left around his eyes, “and perhaps this isn’t the best time for it, anyway.”

“No, I suppose you are right.”  Sebastian retreated to the safer climes of the chair opposite hers, slumping into the well-treated leather.  

He needed distracting, Aeryn thought as she sipped her tea.  “You never did explain to me why you don’t speak the way almost everyone I’ve heard from Starkhaven speak.”  At his raised eyebrow, she hastened to add, “You know, if you want to?”

Sebastian smiled wanly at Aeryn’s attempt to draw his attention elsewhere. “Well, you’ve not come across many of the common folk.  North of the river all the way to the mountains, it’s the usual way to use the old language.  And even in the city, most of the people speak Common with the accent. “  Aeryn settled back into her chair, clearly ready for a good story.  “Do you really want to know, _leannan_?  I’m afraid it does not reflect well on me.”

“Tell me anyway,” she coaxed.

“Well, there’s a fair amount of Orlesian influence in Starkhaven.  Always has been, but since it became common for the children of the nobility to spend a year or two in the Imperial Court, or at least at the university, it’s become a bit more pronounced.”

 _University?_  “I…guess I didn’t realize that you’d gone to school there.”  

“Ah, well that’s because I didn’t.  My father had long since decided to send me to th’ Chantry, Aeryn.  And the scholars are rather well known for their somewhat heretical studies.  There was no point in sending me.”

Confused, she asked, “But you were still expected to sound like you had?”

“To be noble, to be well-educated in Starkhaven, it’s simply expected to speak with no trace of the local, common, accent, Aeryn.”

“You spoke Orlesian, then?  In your private lives?”

“No, we spoke in Common but the accent was Orlesian.  If the common folk spoke with the Starkish accent, we were just expected not to talk like the servants. My brothers, I think, spent more time with the tutors than I did, so it came more natural to them. I ran a bit wild until I was four or so and even then it was my nan or the cook's girls who were keeping me in line. It was only to be expected that I'd pick up the language they used. My grandfather spoke the Starkish, too, though. He'd often converse with the common folk he met.  It never made sense to me, but I was attempting to be good.  I did my best.  Then, I still _wanted_ to do right by my parents.”  

He stopped then, seemingly lost in the memory of it.  

The conversation hadn’t had quite the effect she meant for it to have, Aeryn thought ruefully.  “Sebastian, I understand, I think.  You don’t have to…”

“No…it’s fine.”  But he was still quiet, leaning over his knees and Aeryn slipped from her seat, unable to be still, and walked behind him.  The tendons in Sebastian’s neck were taut with his earlier grief and the stress she’d unwittingly caused by asking about his family.  She set her hands on either side of his neck and when he didn’t flinch away, she began to rub.

After a moment, he spoke again, “I got the switch from the tutors until I spoke correctly. My grandfather would rebuke me for disrespecting my father and so I tried very hard to sound the way they wanted me to. But after he died...I stopped caring so much, you know, and by the time I was fourteen it was an open war between my father and me.”

“The height of it came a year later. Empress Celene did a cruise of the Minanter and stopped at the palace. I had to be presented to her, as a member of the household.   I was told that if I did not speak my piece cleanly I'd be whipped within an inch of my life. I believed it...but, I thought "Why should I try to sound Orlesian to a woman who will know I'm merely aping her?" And I went up to her on the dias and...as broadly as I could, full on in Starkish, greeted her and praised her beauty and elegance gracing my father's court.”    He lifted a brow, mocking his younger self. “Apparently she found me charming.”

 _The young prince, all fresh faced and handsome_? “I bet,” Aeryn smirked. Her thumb grazed his jaw and he smiled at the caress, following her trail of thought.

“Well, maybe there was some of that,  as well.  She was young and I think she was casting about for an easily led husband. She had me sit near her and asked if I sang and I told her, ‘oh, aye and played the lyre too, if she cared for a tune.’ And for the whole of her visit I perched there on a satin cushion next to her chair and entertained her, with wicked pride and venomous joy in my heart for the breaking of my father's edict. And not a thing he could do, when it was at the request of the new Empress.” 

He stared unseeingly into the gloom past the light of the one candle they’d bothered with as she worked on the tightness in his neck and finally Aeryn prompted, "And afterwards?"

“Oh, I got a hiding once the barge was out of sight. But it wasn't too bad. And I...was something of a sensation among the noble ladies after that, wondering what had entertained the empress, so. And too full of my own worth to wonder if perhaps _that_ wasn't a poor idea." Sebastian sighed. "After I went to the Chantry, I tried to go back to the way the tutors had taught thinking that holding on to the Starkish was still an act of defiance. I can, near enough. I sound a bit like Robard. But gradually, I stopped thinking so much of how I sounded and then one day I realized I'd gone back to it. Not quite so broad. And then, you came along and...well, you seemed to enjoy it." He tipped his head back and smiled sweetly up at her.

"Just a bit." Aeryn leaned forward to kiss his temple, then dug her fingers into a knot just behind his shoulder and he grunted as the tension released.

"So...now it's just the way I speak and it's neither an act of will nor an affectation. And I'll not change it to suit fashion. The Prince should sound like his people, I think."

"My rebel prince."  She smirked but he shook his head.

"I made a spectacle of myself all to flout my father and pull attention away from Lucas."  Sebastian frowned at the return of the sharp ferocity that haunted her eyes.  "And what has you so fierce, _mo chridhe_?"

"Just thinking of those noble women who took advantage of a lonely boy."

"He wouldn't have thanked you for it, had you tried to tell him."

“No, probably not as I was all of ten.  He’d have thought of me as an annoyance, at best.”

“His taste has improved, somewhat, I think.”  He reached up and captured her hands, smoothing the fabric of his dark brown tunic.  

Footsteps out in the passageway told them that the rest of the ship was awake, finally.  Aeryn kissed the top of his hair.  “I’m glad to hear it.  Any way you choose to say it.”

 

000000

 

Bethany Hawke was a lot of things.  

A mage.  A sister.  A voracious reader and a reasonably good card sharp.

The elder twin of a broken set.  A good hand at teaching, especially those younger ones who were so afraid of what they could suddenly do with only a thought.  She remembered being afraid and in the hands of someone who wasn’t afraid _of_ her.

One thing she was not, was stupid.  Malcolm and Leandra Hawke had never raised fools.

And whether her sister knew or not, Bethany was also not nearly the heavy sleeper she had been before the Gallows.  Hawke self-preservation was apparently bred in the bone.

So when Aeryn left their shared cabin for the third night in a row, after gasping awake from yet another nightmare, Bethany determined that it had all gone on long enough.  She lit the candle and cracked open the book she’d borrowed from Lady Thèrese and settled back to wait.  Aeryn hadn’t failed to come back to bed, yet.   A pretense of sleep when Sebastian rapped lightly on the door in the mornings, so they could share their early breakfasts together.

Bethany had heard Aeryn assure him just yesterday that she was sleeping fine.  “Must be the sea air.”

She was fairly sure he wasn’t entirely convinced.  He’d brushed her sister’s cheek tenderly with the back of his fingers, just under a faint black circle.  But he’d let it lie, since apparently he couldn’t do anything about it.  Bethany had no such scruples.  She wanted to know what was going on.  

A candlemark later Aeryn, silent as her shadows, appeared around the edge of the door.  Bethany startled and the movement drew her sister’s sharp eyes.  “What’s the matter, Beth?  Can’t sleep?”

“It might be easier if you didn’t have a habit of letting all the cold air in every night when you leave.”

Aeryn resisted the twin impulses to either freeze or escape.  She’d been caught out. _Ah, well.  Sooner or later the questions had to be asked, right?_  Mindful that she’d promised Sebastian that when Bethany finally asked that she would try and answer, Aeryn toed off her light boots and sat tailor fashioned at the end of the cot.  “Just making the rounds.”

Bethany rolled her eyes.  “We’re on a ship in the middle of the Waking Sea and there’s no possessed mage to keep an eye on, now.”

“I never did sleep a lot, you know.”

“Yes.  But that’s not what this is.  This isn’t excess energy and an inability to wind down, Aeryn.  This is you waking up terrified of something every night.  And you don’t have the excuse of Fade spirits trying to vie for your attentions.”

But that wasn’t the best approach it seemed.  Aeryn’s whole posture changed and Bethany saw her edge back out of the candle’s weak circle of light.  “Are you having…problems?”  

“No, I’m not.  I’m…used to the ways they ask.  It’s almost never in the quiet moments, for me.  It’s when I need to do something hard.  Healing Macie,” she confessed.  “That was the last time they really pushed.”

“I wish I hadn’t had to ask.”  Aeryn said solemnly, her eyes locked on her sister.

“Someone had to do it.  I’m glad I could.”  Bethany started to wave her off and tell her to come back to bed, before she realized Aeryn had utterly diverted her attention.  “Stop that!”

“What?”  Aeryn asked, honestly confused.

Bethany waved her hands, exasperatedly. “That…whatever it is you do that makes people talk about themselves and forget that they meant to ask you questions!”

“Do I do that?”

Rubbing her forehead, “Maker, you give me a headache.  How does Sebastian put up with it?”

Relaxing a little, Aeryn sat back against the footboard of the boxed bed.  “You’ve got a headache because you’re up _reading_ of all things in the wee hours of the morning with the most pitiful candle I’ve ever seen after we spent nearly a full day proving to Lady Thèrese that even girls raised in the wilds of Ferelden know how to embroider.”  

“I wanted to talk.”  But why was it so hard?  “What is it you dream of, Aeryn?”

“Death.”

The blunt answer in a soft voice startled Bethany so much that she had to ask again, “Sorry, what?”

“Killing.  Fighting.  Smoke and death and the things I’ve done.  Enjoyed doing. And failed to do.”  Aeryn twisted a smile humorlessly at the wide-eyed look on her sister’s face, forcing herself to stay relaxed.  “You asked.”

“Every night, though?”

“Almost every night.  Sometimes I’m fortunate and the Fade leaves me be, now more often than it used to.”

Bethany twisted her fingers in the linen sheet before she asked, “Because of Sebastian?”

“Maybe?  I don’t know.  I…at least try and come back to bed, now.  It’s better now. “ Aeryn tried to say that with some finality and asked,  “Did you ever get to spend a night with Cullen?  A whole night?”

“Aeryn!”  

She grinned at her sister’s exasperated tone.  “No, this is me asking so I can tell if you understand, not me…doing whatever it is you think I do.”

Bethany bit her lip before she shook her head, a fall of dark hair obscuring her face. “No.  It wasn’t ever possible for us to do anything that…simple.”

 _Sodding Circle._  “Alright, then.  But you have your own nightmares, Beth.  Imagine…having someone there to redirect it, another body, more warmth, a whisper.  A promise that, at least outside your head, it’s alright.  I’ve always done better with people around me, when we shared a room or when we were camping, Sebastian is good at reminding me I’m not alone. For whatever reason, he…gets through.”

“When were you ever alone?”  And Bethany was surprised at the bitterness in her voice, the sudden jealousy that welled up in her.

Aeryn raised a neat eyebrow.  “Bethany…”

“No.  I…was _alone_ , Aeryn.  You always had Father and Mother, Carver tagging at your heels and whatever lover you’d lured into bed and the whole pack of friends in Kirkwall who were happy to bleed for you.  When were you ever alone, except when you wanted to be?”

Aeryn slammed the lid on the hurt retort that sprang to her lips.  It wouldn’t help.  “I…was under the impression that you went to the Circle by choice.”

“You’d been gone nearly two months!  We thought you were dead.  I had to protect Mother from…being tainted by me.  Once I was gone, the Viscount would speak with her.”

“The Viscount spoke with her once we’d repurchased the estate.”  

Bethany heard the detachment in her sister’s voice, a return of the cool tones Aeryn had used with her in Kirkwall and railed against it. “Of course, because it was always you who had to fix everything.  Steal a little coin and we had new shoes.  Cut a throat or two and we could eat a little better. Steal a little more to get us to the Deep Roads and sure, why not steal a title, too.”

“I never wanted that title, Bethany.”  Aeryn had to swallow hard to keep herself approachable, to not throw the bloody Amell name back into the lap of the sister who had pushed for it.  

“I don’t hear you telling people not to use it.  And then you could have had a normal life.  You could have met someone and settled down and you never _did_.  You just kept doing what you liked to do and never mind that Mother went running into the arms of the first murderer she met and _where were you_?”  Bethany clapped her hands over her mouth as her sister visibly wilted under her attack.  “Wait, Aeryn, that’s not… that’s not what I…”

Swallowing again, Aeryn wiped the back of her hand over her lips and stood, wearily.  She leaned against the outer wall of the cabin to look out the porthole, arms wrapped around her stomach. “You’re right.  I did.  Just kept doing the same things I’d always done.  I was out on a job when Mother was taken.  And if she was unhappy…I had no idea, she seemed to be doing pretty well. She seemed better, once we moved to Hightown.”

“Why couldn’t you just…stop?”  That was the question that had always haunted Bethany.  But Aeryn’s answer wasn’t very satisfactory.  

“I don’t know, Beth.  Wish I did. I thought…I thought you were in the Gallows because you wanted to be.  Otherwise I’d’ve had you out.  Anders got more than a few out.”  

“I _did_ want to be there, eventually.  They needed me, those little ones.  I was a good teacher and I could play the obedient mage, well enough.  I knew how to follow orders.”

“I expect you were.”

“I learned a lot.  It was easier when I wasn’t worried about being found.”  

“Good.”

“You were normal, Aeryn.  You could have just…lived, done anything.  I know you had to protect me, but I left so you and Mother could live those lives and…you wasted it.”

“Yeah.”  She pushed away from the wall.  “I’m gonna…I’ll see you.”

Aeryn stepped out of the moonlight, grabbed her boots, and shut the cabin door behind her sending the weak candleflame guttering out.  Bethany stared into the dark and then dropped her head into her hands.  “That was _not_ how that was supposed to go.”

0000000

 

Sebastian stopped by the cabin as usual, only to find a red-eyed Bethany waiting for him at the door.  She opened it before he could rap, as if she’d been listening for him.

“I…really wish you were still a Brother, Sebastian.”

“Why’s that, then?”

“I find myself in need of a confession.  I’ve messed it all up.”

“What did you mess up?  Where’s Aeryn?”  Sebastian refrained from pushing open the door as Bethany was still in her nightrobe.

“Topside, I think.  I…she was going to talk to me, finally and I couldn’t…it was like I couldn’t stop accusing her of…”

“Of what?”   _If Aeryn had finally allowed Bethany to ask her questions and then Bethany had just thrown it in her face?  Holy Maker._  “What?”  He fought to keep his tone low and level but something of the anger that rose up clearly broke through as Bethany’s worried face went just a little pale.

“Not appreciating what she was.”

“And what is that?”

“Not a mage.”

“Maker, help me.”  His hand clenched hard at his side, Sebastian whispered harshly, “You’ve no idea at all, have you?  What she gave for you?”

“How could I?  She never talks to me!  I went to the Circle so she could stop giving, stop having to protect me.”  A hint of that mulish chin with which Sebastian was far too familiar.

“But wasn’t it far too late by then?”  He bit back the impulse, right at the edge of his tongue, to simply tell Bethany when her confusion was clear.  Aeryn would never forgive him, intruding on this matter between family.  And right now, Aeryn was his priority.  “I…Andraste forgive you for it, Bethany.  Excuse me.”  Spinning on his heel, he made for the hatch.  If he knew her at all, she’d be up in the air no matter how cold.  

He didn’t notice Fenris behind him.  The elf cast an eye towards his back, sure that the archer was well able of consoling Hawke.  Bethany had turned away from the open door, tears spilling over. He hesitated before pushing it open further and stood awkwardly on the threshold.  

Hawke’s sister was not openly weeping, but wiping the evidence from her face and Fenris inwardly sighed relief.  He had no experience with tears.  “I always believed you did the correct thing,” he began.

“That…doesn’t surprise me, really.”

“Hawke was upset.  But she respected your choice.  She never plotted your release.”

“I wouldn’t have gone, even if she had.”

“It was your choice,” he said again.  “You had none in being a mage,” Fenris paused then.  “But your sister was also given little choice in her life before Kirkwall.”

“But afterwards…”

He fixed her with deep green eyes and she took a sharp breath.  You could call those beautiful eyes haunted, if you were being dramatic, Bethany thought. “Old habits, Bethany, are hard masters.”

<hr/>

Sebastian didn’t have to look hard to find Aeryn, actually.  She was leaning against the rail near the ship’s wheel, exchanging a word with the captain and fiddling with a catch on the sleeve of her new armor.   He watched her for a minute, trying to gauge her mood, but she was simply talking, no sign that she was feeling any upset.  The cold sunlight gleamed off her hair, neatly braided back from her forehead.  

She saw him and waved him over. “Captain Jans says we’ll be at the port by noon.”  

“So soon?”

“We’ve had good winds.”  Robard’s captain spoke around his pipe, clenched in his teeth. Even though he’d shared their evening meals, they hadn’t gotten to know him well. “Don’t care for the port much, but we can get you in close.  Drop off the skiff.”

“Sounds fine to me.  It’ll be a couple of trips,” she warned him.

“Good exercise.”  

“Alright, I’ll let our companions know.  We’ll be ready by eleven bells, Captain.”  

He grunted an acknowledgement as he spun the wheel, eyes out on the horizon.  It was plain he was already dismissing them as he plotted a course along his mental map of the coastline, considering the best place to drop anchor and they left the sailor to his business.

“Did you sleep well?”  Aeryn asked as Sebastian handed her down the steps.

“I did. But I understand you did not.”

“Well enough, my love.”

Sebastian considered allowing her the illusion.   _No, not this time._ “I spoke with Bethany.”

“Oh. Well.  She…needed to get it out, I guess.”  She cut her eyes over the water, not meeting his too intense gaze.

“ _Mo chridhe_ , did she hurt you?”   The tell-tale blankness settled over her and he knew the answer was yes, but that she wouldn’t acknowledge it.  Again, he cursed Thèrese’s well-meaning interference.  Enough.  They’d be going to shore today.  And he’d not let this distance between them stand.

“Not really, Sebastian.  I just…it wasn’t going to be helped by me yelling back at her, so…I just left.  I’m all right.”

“Aeryn.”  

“I don’t have time for this, Sebastian.  We need to get ready.”  She turned to walk back to the hatch, intending to pack.  She wanted to lean into him, but there was time enough for that later.

Instead, Sebastian reached out to grab her hand and settling against the rail, he pulled her close.  She hesitated for a moment, but drawn to the lingering fir scent of his shaving soap, Aeryn wrapped her arms around him and laid her head against his chest.

For a moment he just ran a hand along her spine, the rigid column as seemingly unbending as the wood behind him.

“We can’t hide here, Sebastian.  Tide waits for no drunken binge nor hangover, as Isabela might say.”

“The tide can wait for this,” he whispered into her ear.  “She had no right to…”

“Sure she did.”

“No, she did not. Not to hurt you.”

“Sisters fight, Sebastian.  And…no one knows how to hurt you more.  It’s just part of it.  Next time, she won’t yell so much and maybe…I can try and explain _.”  There, she sounded reasonable and sensible and he couldn’t fault that, surely?_ Sebastian’s heartbeat was slow and steady under her cheek.  His lips brushed against her temple, one hand carding into her hair and massaging gently against the ridge behind her ear.  Aeryn could feel her control slip a little, as she relaxed.  Resisting the tears that knotted in her throat, she stiffened again and tugged away from him.  “No.  I’ll let you coddle me a little later, alright?”  She looked up, the concern in his eyes luring her back to his promise of comfort.

“You would not call it coddling if it were me, would you?  Nor Fenris.  For us, you’d be up in arms.”

“But…”

With a bit of nonchalance he was quite proud of, he told her, “For the life of me, if you tell me you dinna matter ever again I will either shake you or drop you in th’ sea for a dousing.”

She gave a choked laugh, before answering him quietly, “There’s this one difference, love.  If we fought…if you or Fenris or Varric decided you didn’t want to travel with me anymore then you could leave and live your lives.  If Bethany decides she doesn’t want to travel with us, what’s left to her? Up in the Marches where there’s a price on my head and likely hers as well, as a runaway apostate?  She could hop a boat back to Ferelden, but she’d have to trust a captain she doesn’t know, alone, with no one to watch her back.”

He hadn’t thought about that.  Bethany wouldn’t be the first apostate on the run, of course.  But she likely had little idea of what that life would entail, on her own.  Her options would be limited.

“Not only that, but she blames me still.  For Mother.  Maybe even for Carver.”

“Your mother’s death was not your fault.”

Aeryn heard the chide in his voice and ducked her head, in an offhand shrug, “Maybe not.  But she wasn’t there and I was.  She knows that I did my best, or so she says but it’s…she needs to let it out.  I can take it.”

Sebastian lifted her chin with a gloved finger.  “You are not to let her make you into a scapegoat nor a punching dummy.”

Wanting to dispel the sense of him scolding her, Aeryn dipped him a curtsey though the mocking smirk probably ruined it a bit.  “As you wish, my prince.”

“Minx.”

In a whirl of  movement, Aeryn wrapped her fingers into the fur at his collar and pressed her lips to his.  She had to stop herself from running her tongue along the seam of his mouth, seeking out the warmth and the taste of him.  They’d be ashore soon enough and she could find her comfort in the way she liked best.

He snuggled her close, feeling her restraint through the tautness of her kiss and sighing for it.  “I’ve missed you, _à ruin.”_

She couldn’t resist the tease, at the forlorn sound of his voice.  “Oh, come now.  I’ve been in your pocket for the last two weeks. How could you miss me?  We’ve had every meal together.  We’ve played every variation of Wicked Grace known to Varric and Fenris and I’ve even managed to nearly beat you at chess once.  Also, you’ve watched me embroider the blazes out of a nice pair of slippers.  We’ve been _utterly_ intimate.”

Cupping her cheek he held her gaze, watching her sharper edges ease as he spoke.  “Not the same as seeing the first light on your sweet face in the morning.  There’s been no soft sigh as you relax against me and I’ve lost the scent of you on my skin.”  Feeling a little foolish, with the lover’s talk here on the open deck and the crew shooting them curious looks, Sebastian finished with, “Also, you snore a bit less than Varric.  And then there’s Fenris and his sword polishing into the wee hours.”

His joke broke the spell his low, rich voice had been weaving around them and Aeryn blinked before grinning, saucily. "Well, Isabela isn't around to give him a hand, anymore." Her nose was wrinkled and he kissed it, grinning back.

“No, I meant actual polishing.  Apparently broadswords take undue attention, with all the salt in the air.”

Aeryn chuckled and Sebastian felt the last of the tension leach from her back.  There.  He’d accomplished that, at least.

 

.  

 

 

 

 

 

 


	22. Chapter 22

Aeryn rapped on the cabin door and Fenris poked his tousled pale head out.  “We’re going to drop anchor, soon.  Ready?”

“Yes.  Varric is…amending his pack.  Again.”

From inside, the dwarf’s rich voice called, “You want me to travel light?  I’m travelling light.  But it takes finesse, Broody.  Not all of us consider a flagon of polish and a couple of changes of smalls sufficient to the day.”

Fenris gave Aeryn a slight smile.  “Hmm. Perhaps not.”

Quietly, she asked, “So…you’re all right?  With the arrangement we discussed?”

He nodded.  “It seems a sensible precaution and a ruse we are both suited to fulfilling with little effort, Hawke.  I doubt Sebastian is the sort to take undue advantage.  I would not care to play servant to Isabela, for instance.”

His eyes held a note of mirth and Aeryn grinned at him before she answered.  “No, with Isabela, she might require _glistening_.”

“Or insist that a lack of pants was customary in one’s servants, yes.”

“I wouldn’t be so cautious, but Aveline seemed pretty sure that there was a definite price out on us.”

Fenris paused before he asked, “Was Sebastian amenable?”

“Well, he didn’t like it, but what choice do we have, really?”  It was something of an understatement.  When she’d handed Sebastian the plain leather purse she normally dealt out of, he’d taken it from her with a note of surprise.

“What’s this, then?”

“Well, it’s either you or Varric to be in charge in this part of the world.  I figured you’d be less conspicuous, unless you want to pretend to have him as your man and step into the ‘too good for talking to commoners’ sort of noble role.  That’ll draw more attention, though.”

At his confusion, she’d reminded him of the letter Aveline had sent.  It had only reached them the day they’d left Denerim, having travelled through several of Varric’s contacts.  “Fenris is fairly eye-catching.  I have a price on my head.  We can’t be out in front.  You could escort Bethany, with the three of us as your guard.  Or Beth needs to be travelling with Varric or Fenris, alone, and we can split that way.  We lucked into a safe situation in Amaranthine, love.  I can almost guarantee we won’t be so fortunate, this time.”

He didn’t like it, but she was right and he knew it.  Aveline’s letter had included a post script that she’d had to give a description of Aeryn to an agent of the Divine, come to investigate the destruction of the Chantry.  Aveline swore that she’d been misleading, but as it was well-known that she and Aeryn were friends, the Guard-Captain had to cooperate, to some extent.  In the end, Sebastian had just clenched his jaw and nodded. 

“Fine.  Do not expect me to bark orders or treat you cruelly.”

She rubbed her fingers over his tensed forearm, soothing the tight muscles, and smiled up into his eyes.  “We’re coming from Ferelden.  If you’re lenient and friendly with your guard, the Marchers will just assume you picked up a few bad habits from the barbarians.”

With a snort, he’d nodded again, squeezed her fingers and tucked the plainly worked purse into his jerkin. 

 Robard and Therese and Cleve gathered on deck to see them off, once the ship made its anchor-drop.  Therese patted the little reticule she carried, indicating to Sebastian that she had his note and would see that it got to its destination.  He gave her a small nod as Aeryn swung over the side into the skiff.

 A few nights before, while Aeryn and Fenris were trouncing Bethany and Varric in a game, the older woman had cornered him while objectively handing him a tumbler of wine.

“She’s lovely and accomplished.  A beautiful grown woman as opposed to the girl you might have ended up with.  A woman like that…one could say choosing her is a sign of your maturity, Prince Vael.”

“Ah.  Thank you?”

“Why, then, haven’t you married her?”  Unlike the last time they’d spoken of a private matter, Thèrese was far more direct.  Sebastian wondered if it was simple familiarity or something else. 

“I must say I’ve wondered the same.”  Robard agreed, casually, looking at him with cooly amused dark eyes.  Sebastian was well aware that these two had six married children and four of them girls.  He’d met one, when she came visiting her aunt in Starkhaven.  Charlotte, her name was.  Sweet and jolly with a tangle of dark curls and snapping black eyes.  And apparently quite happily married in Jader.  Were they attempting to act in _loco parentis_ for Aeryn?  It made him want to smile, even as he strove to come up with an answer that wouldn’t invade her privacy.

“She’s not so easy a woman to pin down as you’d think.”

“You’ve asked then and she said no?”

“Not exactly.”  He shrugged.  “No…I just wanted to…”  He stopped to gather his thoughts.  “You must know, there are the old stories, the old traditions.  Do you recall how, when, Tirion Vael took the throne of Starkhaven, after they made him prince of the city, he married a Fereldan woman.  Took her to his family’s seat on the southern plain and married her in the sacred copse?”

“You think to recreate that?  That’s rather a far stretch, just to create a connection to an old story.”

“It’s more that…have you ever been there, Lady Thèrese?”  She shook her head, jangling the dark garnet earrings she wore.  “My grandfather took me, more than once.  He was fond of the place as he and my grandmother were betrothed there, though propriety had them married in the Chantry.”

Sebastian drew a finger around the edge of his glass, recalling, “It’s beautiful, in the early spring.  The peach and cherry orchards come into bloom there earlier than anywhere else in Starkhaven.  They’ll be in bloom by her name day, if what you say is true and the winter has been mild.  There’s that high cliff that over-looks the fields.  Grandfather said it was wheat in his day, but I went through there a few years ago, looking for the murderers of my family.  They’ve planted lavender as far as the eye can see.  Not so practical, I suppose, but lovely.  And the fragrance enough to carry you to the Maker’s side.  Bees buzzing and the soft breeze.”  He broke off the memory.  He’d grieved hard in that place, for the chance he’d lost to try and mend things with his family.  Clearing his throat, he continued.

“Kirkwall…was brutal.  Ugly, even in the upper reaches where they plant flowering vines to cover the stench of Darktown and the rotting piers.  The Wounded Coast.  The Bone Pit.  She used to joke about it, the horrible names they gave to the surrounding areas.  And it’s all Aeryn knows of the Marches, really.  She loved Ferelden, loved the trees and its wildness.  When I ask her to join my life…to make her my bride, I want to do it somewhere that tells her that there is beauty to be found in Starkhaven.  I want to see her with flowers in her hair and at her feet.  When I make her a Starkhavener, I want it to be in the most beautiful place I can think of.”

Therèse was looking at him with happy crinkles around her eyes and Robard had a slight smile lurking behind his luxurious mustaches.  “Lucky girl.”  Sebastian felt a slight flustered blush run up the back of his neck and bowed before he turned back to stand behind Aeryn’s chair and encourage her in her play.

And now Thèrese would carry the note to the Mother of the Chantry in the little village nearby to assure that all would be ready when they passed through.

 

000000

 

The port village of Markham, just twenty leagues down the coast from Kirkwall, was perhaps not the safest landing they could find, Aeryn mused as the skiff slowly inched towards the shore.  But any farther and they’d be walking for well over a week to get to the location in the Vimmarks that Varric was sure marked the Carta’s hiding place. 

In anticipation, Aeryn had worn her cloak and hood as had Fenris.  Her daggers were strapped around her hips and she wore the short bow that Sebastian had taken to slung over her shoulder, instead, while Fenris had switched to a pair of long swords.  Not his best skills, but he was proficient and with any luck at all they wouldn’t run into trouble any time soon.  His broad sword and Sebastian’s bow were strapped into a travois that Varric would haul.  They were as obscured as they could be. 

They were quiet in the skiff as Jans’ sailor rowed them ashore.  The sea was placid and the air raw, and they huddled in their cloaks, avoiding the occasional arc of icy salt water spraying off of the flying oars. 

The dockside was relatively quiet, lines rotting on old piers and a few baskets lashed here and there for catches.  Isabela had said Markham was a port that catered mostly to fishing boats trying to avoid the port taxes of Kirkwall and Ostwick and the occasional raider ship trying to keep a low profile by pretending to be one of those innocuous fishing boats.  “It’s not fancy, it’s not safe after dark, but you won’t be the first travelers blown off course, either.”

The guard, a lean, bulbous nosed man with greying dark hair, gave them a jaundiced eye.  “Shipwreck?” he grunted.

Fenris answered in his grave tone, “No.  Blown off course in a storm.  Captain’s trying to make up time.”

“Hmm.  There’s a head tax of two sovereigns for visitors.”

“One. And a silver each, for your kindness.”

The guard shrugged.  “Easy enough to say there were only two of you.”  Sebastian handed the four sovereigns and a handful of silver to Fenris, who dropped them on the ledge of the guard’s window.  With a sweep of his hand, the guard pocketed the whole, but there was no sense in protesting.

Aeryn’s eyes scanned the postings, nailed to the pickets of the guardhouse, only to snap back to an almost familiar visage drawn in black ink on a piece of parchment, yellow and brittle thanks to the winter weather.  She didn’t allow her eyes to stop again, in case she drew attention with her curiosity.  She’d seen it clearly enough.  _Bloody Void._   Well, Aveline had done her best, clearly, despite the fact that prevarication had never come easily to the Captain.  It didn’t look _exactly_ like her, anyway. Aeryn waited until they were a few steps along the boardwalk before she drew her hood further up, grateful for the gloom of the frosty afternoon. 

“I’ll join you in a minute,” she whispered to Fenris and ducked behind a rickety wooden building, a shop of some sort but closed and shuttered.

Sebastian noticed her departure, but Fenris shook his head and kept walking.  Unless he wanted to make a scene, Sebastian had no choice but to continue on, trusting that Fenris knew where Aeryn had disappeared to and that their straying partner would turn up.

And she did, just a block farther on, when the two men were nearly to the market.  He wanted to question, but they were trying to build some separation between themselves and Bethany and Varric’s arrival. 

Even so, they stopped in the market.  It was busier than the lonely dockside, but not by much.  A few bony fishwives hawked dried cod and barrels of salt and one or two more prosperous travelling merchants had carts piled with vegetables and dry goods, while cats and a scrawny dog darted under the feet of the half dozen shoppers.  There were a couple of permanent shops, as well, their painted signs weather-beaten and nearly unreadable, but likely known to the locals.  All in all Markham gave the impression of a village just on the edge of subsistence.   Farther down the main street, there was a Chantry, a small stone building with a bell tower that looked as if it might fall down in a high wind.  A chanter stood next to the board, looking ragged and chilled in her plain brown robes and sandals, the fine scarlet of Kirkwall’s Chantry nowhere to be seen.   Her voice was thin and easily carried away on the sea breeze.

Sebastian stood to the side as Aeryn made arrangements for supplies to be delivered to the inn by morning, doling out coin when it was called for.  She pushed her hood back, just a touch, while trying to negotiate a lower price for dried beef.

She’d washed off most of her lipstain and the kohl she was fond of for her eyes.  When Sebastian had first met her Aeryn tended to make herself up a bit more, giving her the appearance of a carefully painted doll.  She’d used a lighter hand in recent years, but still, the lack of her customary decoration gave her an altered appearance.  Slightly plainer, a little less memorable _,_ thanks to something rubbed into her skin that dulled her glowing complexion and caught in the fine lines around her eyes and lips, making her appear a touch older.  The braid that held back her bangs was gone and her hair was skinned back into a short ponytail, just barely long enough to be called so, escaping wisps of her bangs draggled along either side of her face instead.  Nothing drastic, nothing to catch the eye; just a working woman on a mission and too busy to bother with vanity. 

Aeryn asked the last merchant about inns, once he’d packaged up her purchase, and got directions to a side street.  She set off, Fenris in the rear surreptitiously looking for followers, and incidentally for Varric and Bethany.  Sebastian stopped her when he noticed the small stable on the other side of the narrow market street.  “Should we hire horses, do you think?” 

A burly armed man, with a plain but well kept sword on his hip, spoke up as he passed them on the boardwalk.  “You don’t want to hire from Gastin, serah.  His horses are all cribbers and spavined.”  Sebastian bowed in thanks and the man raised his hand in farewell.

Following the swordsman with her eyes, Aeryn shook her head.  “I don’t ride, anyway, messere.  Nor does my partner.  Of course, you should if you’d like.  We can keep up.”

He managed not to shudder at her deferential tone or her cool eyes.  “No.  Best we all travel the same.  Horses require a lot of care, anyway.”  Sebastian thought he gave a decent impression of a noble resigned to briefly reduced circumstances.  Reaching for the bag of small goods she’d sat down on the dusty boardwalk, he had to cover with a stretch when she glared from under cover of her deep hood.

“You’d know best, messere,” was all she said, though, as she shouldered the bag and with a sigh, he followed her in the direction of the inn. 

The Gull’s Wing was a low-slung building made of coralstone and clearly weathered by years of coastal storms.  Sebastian wondered that Isabela had recommended the place, as it was fairly far from the docks and older than the other two inns they had passed.  However, when Fenris held the door open an appetizing scent of stew and bread wafted out. 

Sebastian arranged for two rooms, something ‘decently large’ for himself and a smaller accommodation close by for his guards and tried to rent the dining room for privacy, but gave in easily enough when the clerk protested about the other guests.  “We aren’t so big as all that, messere.” The innkeeper rolled her eyes at Aeryn, who kept an impassive face.  “Wouldn’t be fair to other folks.”

 

Aeryn pushed the door open on the room that they were shown to, looking into the wardrobe and behind the curtained off privy while Sebastian tested the bed, gingerly standing back up when the ropes that held the mattress gave a distressed creak. 

“It will do, I’m sure.”  He gave the innkeeper what he hoped was a charming grin.

“I’ll just leave you to change for supper, then, messere.” Aeryn gave him a slight bow and followed the innkeeper out.

With Fenris at the table by the door and Aeryn across the room at the table closest to the kitchen, Sebastian ate alone at first, but when the dwarf and his companion, garbed in veil and dark mourning, entered Sebastian invited them to join him, expansively expressing the need for a bit of civil company.

The two travelers joined him and as they ordered, he did his best not to watch his guard.  He couldn’t help but notice, though, when she pushed away the bowl half finished.

The little maid noticed, too, when she came to check her customers.  “No good, dearie?”

Aeryn answered with a broader Fereldan accent than Sebastian had heard her use before.  “Nah, s’lovely.  Just…got off a boat, you know?  Not much of an appetite, yet.”  She shrugged with a grin.  “I’m sure I’ll make up for it in the morning.”

“See you do, then.”  Aeryn got a wink from the maid and Sebastian got a kick from Varric, as well as a raised eyebrow.

He faked a yawn when Varric invited him to play a game and apologized gallantly to Bethany, citing an early morning. Aeryn preceded them up the stairs and Sebastian took advantage to ask the elvhen serving maid if she’d mind terribly finding him a tray with tea and a bit of bread and cheese.

“Wasn’t supper enough, messere?”  She looked a little horrified, with good reason.  The portions had been generous and several servings had been offered. 

“Everything was fine,” he assured her.  “I’m just accustomed to a bit of a tea before bed.”

Big brown eyes wide, the girl bobbed a curtsey.  “As you like, messere.  I’ll bring it up straight away.”

He stuck his head into the room at the top of the stairs.  Catching a glimpse of Aeryn’s  hair, he shut the door and waited with Fenris.  The maid was prompt, bringing up a loaded tray.  Thanking her with a slight bow that brought a flush to the elf’s cheeks, he allowed Fenris to open the door for him and with a soft good night, went in to Aeryn. 

She knelt quietly at the hearth on the far side of the room and stirred up the fire in the small hearth.   As he balanced the tray of bread and cheese against his hip, she began the process of unbuckling the latches and catches of her armor. The cloak and hood she'd laid over a chair by the fire to dry. Each piece came away and she arranged it neatly in front of her. Rolling up to unbuckle the thigh straps that held her pouches from flapping and the dagger sheath. The short slog from the docks had done nothing to require maintenance, bar a swipe from a soft dry cloth across the leather.

Down to his tunic already, Sebastian had only to watch her, something in her silence holding him at bay even when she stood to unlace and shuck her trousers leaving her in only the pale green knitted stockings she'd worn against the chill and the long green wool tunic, its white embroidered hem catching the firelight.  Her back was still turned to him when she reached back to loosen the tie she'd drawn her hair back into.

The pencil sketch on the guardhouse had depicted her with longer hair. Apparently it hadn't occurred to Aveline that Aeryn might grow it out. The loosed hair hid the white nape of her neck now, her delicately shaped ears.  Lovely as it was, Sebastian didn't think he'd miss it if she chose to cut it again.

Aeryn crossed her arms and pulled the tunic over her head revealing the pale curves of her body; her muscled back and fluid spine, the sweet swell of her hips.

As much as he had missed the feel of her skin beneath his fingers, the way she writhed beneath him and gasped her pleasure it was _this_ he'd missed the most. The intimate moments of being with her, unself-conscious and free.  He had wanted that privilege as much as any in those long years before they became lovers and giving it up even for the span of weeks had been difficult. 

She padded across the rough floorboards with little indication she saw him to the stand with pitcher and bowl.  Pouring water into the basin, neat as any cat, she washed her hands and face, removing the traces of whatever she'd used to make herself appear older.  She glanced up at him, her face bare and soft in the small glass that hung over the washstand and he set the tray down on the small circular table next to a chair.

Aeryn had heard Sebastian come in and felt the warmth of his gaze on her back.  She went about her ablutions, waiting for him to move but when she got as far as the washbasin and he hadn't, she couldn't help but look.

Even watching her from beneath hooded eyes, the smile on his face was gentler than she expected.  Any other man would have pounced, grabbed, asked her to move a certain way so that he could see what he wanted of her.  But Sebastian was...ever unique.  Appreciative of the quiet moments. 

And normally, normally _she_ would appreciate that about _him_ , but just now... 

Aeryn had played acts all her life, slipped in and out of various characters with ease, but seeing him sitting at table; eating and conversing with Bethany and Varric, as if she'd never been a part of their circle…it had hurt her somehow. 

She'd felt cold and cut off and _unreal,_ as if she’d been trapped in the Fade.

Even now, he moved slowly until he was just behind her, he caressed the tense knot at the top of her spine with a just firm enough stroke that her knees nearly buckled from the bliss of it.  

Something was wrong, but he wasn’t quite sure what.  "I don't know how you do it." He murmured as he kept up the slow stroking, letting the heat of his hand transfer to her chilled skin.

"How's that?"

"A tilt of your head, a bit of dirt smudged just so, a touch of face paint and you're near enough a different person that I have to look twice to be sure."  

"Easy enough tricks to learn.  I'm rather surprised more people don't try."  Laying the washrag over the side of the earthenware bowl, she turned slightly, leaning into him until his arms came about her.  "It's always just me, though. Shedding a skin like a snake."

He heard the question in her wistful statement and frowned at the gooseflesh that rose across her stomach.  He chafed his hands over her bare shoulders and maneuvered them closer to the small fire. "Or flashing like a jewel.  One facet after another.  It's never dull to watch you in the light," he dropped his voice as he reassured her, whispering into her ear and when she shivered again it wasn’t with cold.   She turned her freshly scrubbed face up for a kiss and tipping her chin slightly, he brushed his lips across hers. The familiar jolt of need raced across his nerves, but some fragility in the way she held herself made Sebastian continue to move cautiously.  

Aeryn snaked her hands, cool from the water, under his tunic and up his lean torso, feeling the twitch of muscle as he reacted to the chill on her skin.  "Sorry."

Nuzzling her hair, he chuckled, "Now what else am I here for but to warm your poor hands?"  

"I can think of one or two things."  Her voice dropped a little, sweet and throaty and she shifted up to her toes and grazed his jaw with her nose.

"Ah...of course.   I _did_ bring a snack."  

A clunking sound as a chair shifted in the next room sent Aeryn stiff and wary, her eyes glancing to the shuttered window, then the door.  Sebastian frowned at the startled alertness and set his hands to stroking again.  "It was just your sister moving a bit of furniture.  Are you all right?"

Her smile was faint, but there the dimple popped up and he relaxed.  "Yeah.  Just...spooked, I guess.  Nevermind." 

"Well and I will mind it, if you think we should maybe move on before morning, then perhaps we should heed that intuition?"

Aeryn hesitated, considering the idea, then shook her head.  "No, we'd attract more attention, leaving before morning.  Now, we're just travelers who chose a poor time of the year to wander.  If we disappear into the night, we're mysterious and gossip worthy."

"You'll know best."  

“Right now…now I need you to take this off."  She tugged at the hem of his tunic and obligingly, he shucked it off, laying it neatly next to hers on the wooden chair next to the wash basin.

 She couldn't tell him exactly what was wrong.  It would upset him to know he'd accidently hurt her and what could he do anyway?  The ruse was still necessary.  But she could tell him some of it.  Aeryn traced the fine line of an old scar along his shoulder. “It bothers me more than I thought it would.”

His hand stilled where it had been drawing circles on her hip, “What’s that?”

“The idea that all those people back in Kirkwall…all they think of me now is that I helped destroy the Chantry.” 

Sebastian swallowed.  Well, that was grand.  She finally managed to tell him her troubles without inordinate amounts of coaxing and he was more like to be able to broker a friendship between Ferelden and Orlais complete with dancing and weddings than fix what was hurting her.  “You don’t know that.  Aveline wasn’t sure exactly why they were after you.”

She shrugged, “Logic, though.  I mean…I always knew most of the nobles wanted to see the back of me.  But I thought I did some good for the common folk.”

“You _did_.  _Leannan_ , you did plenty of good for them.  Took care of troubles that no one else bothered to address.” 

“I never thought I’d want to see Kirkwall again.  But there’s a part of me that wants to go back.  I want to _explain_ , as best I can.”

His fingers clutched involuntarily on her hip and shoulder and he bit back a vehement denial.  “I…don’t think that would be the best idea.”

“No.  Probably not.” She traced the firm line of his collarbone, with her nose, her lips whispering across his breast before she looked up into his worried face, “I know.  I do.”

 She stretched up, her hands on either side of his neck to urge him toward her and kissed him again, her mouth just a touch sour from the watered ale she’d sipped at dinner, hot and demanding.  Underneath the seeming eagerness, though, Sebastian could feel the hesitation that had been there since they got onto the ship.  This time, though, there was no reason not to attempt to work past it.

He parted his lips, and flicked the edge of his tongue across her plumped lower lip pressed softly against his.  With an approving hum in the back of her throat she opened to his request, then surged closer, insistent as her fingers curled, digging into his shoulders.  Sebastian slid his hand down her arm to take up her hand.  The little arrow was still there, had been every time he’d looked, still to his amazement.  Clasping her hand in his, he cuddled it between his neck and shoulder.  “Are we in a hurry, then?”

“Aren’t we?” She slid her free hand up his lean stomach again, reveling in the feel of Sebastian’s smooth, warm skin, the crispness of that lovely, intriguing line of hair that ran down.  “I missed you, love.  I want you.”  His cock was already half hard, and she let her fingers dally along the outlined length before she loosed the laces.

It took a great deal of control to not just to pull her into the bed, when her voice got that husky, breathy note to it.  Sebastian steadied his resolve, though.  “ _Mmmn_ , I don’t know why we should be.  I had a thought to take my time, _mo chridhe_.  Savor it a bit.”  This time, he tasted willow and mint on her breath when she sucked his lower lip and looked up at him with pale eyes through her red lashes.

“There’s something to be said for rushing fences the way you do…but we could, here, take the time.  We’ll be in tents for the foreseeable future.  We’ve got this pleasant, hopefully flea free bed, now.”

“Rushing,” he trailed his finger down the curve of her ear and Aeryn had to swallow at the jolt that ran through her, “fences?”

“Rushing, hurrying, jumping into things like it’s a challenge or we might not have the time. Maker knows, y’do test a man’s resolve.  All the little sighs and sweet moans until all I can think of is t’bury myself in you and run full tilt into pleasure right along with you.”

She didn’t want to slow down, but he had the most intriguing light in his bright eyes, like he’d thought of an adventure.  Far be it for her to deny him an adventure.  “Um…what did you have in mind, then?” 

“Just a moment.”  He turned from her and, to her surprise, began to rummage through her pack.

“What are you after?”

“Your…, aha, here it is.”  Triumphantly, he pulled out the small blue glazed pot with the wooden stopper that Bethany had stored her last batch of almond cream in.  She lifted an eyebrow at him, cocking her head.

“You need a bit of coddling, _à ruin._   And I’m wanting to have my hands on every inch of you.  I thought perhaps, well, a bit of a rub-down.”  Aeryn was fascinated by the dark flush that ran up his neck as he popped the stopper out and took a dollop of the rich concoction.  “Just for starters?”

“I suppose… if you want?” 

“I do.”  He waited until she sat on the bed, creaking ropes telling him it might have been awhile since the piece had been used.  Then he sat back on his heels and neatly folded down her stockings, setting them to the side.

Sebastian started at her toes and she watched him somewhat skeptically.   But as he began to rub the cream in, with long languorous strokes, kissing the high arches and her trim ankles, Aeryn began to find herself a bit more enthusiastic about the whole idea.

“Hmm…it’s a bit tingly.”

“Elfroot,” Aeryn told him breathlessly, as Sebastian lingered over her knees.  He’d shaved before dinner and his cheeks were satiny against the skin on her thighs when he nuzzled there. 

“Ah, that explains it. Now, look here.”  He pressed soft lips an inch higher.  “I’ve found a freckle I did not even know you had.” 

“Really?” 

“Just a wee, pale golden freckle.   Like someone dripped a speckle of gilt on the porcelain.”  His tongue touched it, just at the crest of her knee.  “How could I have missed such treasure?”

Aeryn shifted under his strong, rough fingers as he made gentle circles up her thighs, “Daft man.”

Sebastian glanced up, to see if she was as exasperated as she sounded.  Her eyes were closed and there was a smile playing over her lips, though.

He took a long moment, tracing the little dagger tattoo on her inner thigh with a reverent finger, then a slow, dedicated tongue and she swallowed a whine when he didn’t immediately travel the short distance to her center. Slow, he said.  She could do slow.  She had all sorts of patience.

 Instead, he set warm hands on either hip and whispered something in Starkish she didn’t quite catch into her navel.

“W..what was that?”

“Naught but a little mental note.”  He breathed against her stomach and watched the sensitive little hairs caught gold in the light, rise and lift with sharp, avid eyes as he pulled the ties on her smalls.  “Dinna mind.”  Muscle shifted under her taut skin, but she held herself still under his attention. 

He slipped his hand behind her and released the little wire hooks on her breast band and then followed the curve of her ribcage with his hands.   He paused for a minute, enjoying the weight of sweet flesh  before he began to massage the scented cream in with careful attention, squeezing and circling the rosy tips until she gasped, finally unable to keep from it. 

A slow, pleased sort of smirk curled across his mouth and it sent another wave of warmth down her nerves when he bent to take a pebbled nipple into his mouth.

“Sebastian… _oh_.”

 She reached for him, intending to pull him back over her but he evaded her grasp.  “Just you wait.  I’m not quite done,” he teased when she grumbled.

Leaning back on his heels, Sebastian urged her to roll over so that he could lavish attention on her back, on the long lean muscles that lined her spine and the sweet curve of her arse and dallying in the dimples that sat there _. Maker bless these dimples._ He studded kisses around them.

Despite the erotic haze that sprang from being the center of his focus Aeryn felt herself slipping into a drowsy stupor, the last week of broken sleep catching up with her.  She was unable to follow him as the almost constant tension that tightened her body loosed under his dedicated attentions.  His beautiful hands, strong and firm and gently rough. He seemed to surround her; never a hurried moment, never a misplaced touch and it made her brain spin like rum on a hot day.  She closed her eyes, warm and safe.

He heard her breathing slow even as the rosy flush crept up under her fine skin. Lying beside her on the old, linen sheet he eased slick fingers between her thighs and murmured when he found her folds swollen and wet, “Dinna fall asleep on me, _now_.  I have plans yet.” 

“Hmm.” 

He laughed again at her sleepy agreement and the warmth of it had her curling against him, wrapping her arms around his neck sweetly and when the heated length of his erection twitched between them, it was her turn to laugh, wriggling her hips against him and kissing the groan from his lips. 

“Are we still taking our time, love?”

“Sure.”  He sounded a bit strangled as her rough fingers slid down his stomach and gripped his cock, one thumb strumming over the crown and wresting another groan from him, even as he sucked hot, open mouthed kisses down her neck.  “If you’re tired of being pampered.”

 “Not complaining, mind you.  Just…can we go faster now?”  There was something plaintive and wanting in her voice and he yielded, rolling and pulling her up to straddle his hips.  The wooden frame of the cot squeaked and shook at the sudden movement.

“You go as fast as you’d like, _à ruin_ , and I’ll meet your pace.” His last word folded into a hiss as she, in a lithe move, raised and sank down on his cock, with a practiced snap of her hips.  Her eyes, smoky with want in the flickering firelight, locked on his and her fingers dug into his chest as she balanced her weight forward. 

Under his hands, the muscles in her thighs strained as she worked herself on him.   Greedily, he watched…the bounce of her breasts, the parted lips, the low grunted breaths as she moved harder, faster, rocking. 

Aeryn ….letting everything go but the stretch and slide of his cock inside her.  _So beautiful._

He shifted slightly, to meet her more fully and dragged one hand to her clit, thumbing it in a tight circle that threw her rhythm off a moment as the sensation unfurled beneath her skin.  She’d closed her eyes, but opened them now, slit like a cat’s and gleaming. 

Sebastian smiled up at her, that slow, loving smile that he saved just for her and it lodged in her heart, true as any shot he’d ever made.  She’d once thought she could not need him, not want him.  That she’d forget him if she tried hard enough.  _Always been a liar, even to yourself._   Aeryn pressed down, tightening around his cock just to see his eyes blaze and his kiss-bruised lips part in a gasp.

He thrust to meet her and when she went rigid he thrust again, harder, his hands shifted to her arse, gripping her sweated flesh to hold her so that he could drive her through the climax.

When she relaxed again he rolled her onto her back, to nuzzle between her breasts, licking to taste the salt that bloomed on her flushed skin.  She shivered beneath him and he looked up. The little curl of a smile at the corner of her lip was like sweet praise, though she’d done the work that round. 

He mapped the curve of her breast, full and rounded at the bottom, sloped up her chest.  Tracing one blue vein under the translucent skin there till it disappeared at her collarbone.  He set his teeth in the skin there and she whined and bucked her hips.

“More.”

“You were tired, I thought,” he teased.

“I’m _starved_.  More.” Her heel kicked to spur him on like a recalcitrant horse and he grinned, even as he spread her thighs farther with a knee.

“Oh, aye.  More it is, _mo chridhe_.”  He slid into her, a low, self-satisfied note escaping his throat as she stretched beneath him.

“I love you, you know.”  Her hair was sweaty and tangling and he smoothed it back from her cheeks, where desire had flushed them bright.

“I do.  And I love you.  Until the end of my days.”

Sebastian dragged his hands down her arms, to lock her fingers with his pinning her hands and when she curved her crooked smile at him and arched her eyebrow beckoningly, he thrust again, indulging in a slower pace than she’d run. Reveling in the slick, hot clutch of her welcoming sheath and the arc of her back.  With an urgent, hungry little moan, she dragged him closer, the strong length of her legs twining with his until their hips jarred together, a rhythmic puzzle.

For that blissful few minutes, it seemed like it _was_ forever.  Just the soft moans of her, his whispered adoration as he stroked slowly, steadily, heat building exquisitely in the friction, the caress of her body.  The bed creaked ominously beneath them, but they were far too gone, lost in each other to pay it much mind.

Right up to the moment when, just as Sebastian obeyed the thrum in his nerves begging him to move faster, in a cloud of musty wood dust, the whole bedframe lurched to the side and threatened to collapse entirely as the ropes holding the frame together loosened and stretched. 

They went very still, wide eyed and shocked, just as the whole thing crashed to the floor. 

A startled shout came from next door and then there was a squeaky voice that sounded entirely unlike Bethany through the wall.  “Um.  Do you….ah, need any…help?  In there?”

Sebastian found his voice first, as Aeryn had her hand clasped over her mouth, trying to smother her smile.  “No.  No.  I think we’re fine.  Sleep well.”

Quite dryly came the reply and Sebastian closed his eyes, wincing, “Well, I was _trying_ to.”

Aeryn was shaking under him and he looked down to see if she was hurt from their landing, but it was only laughter wracking her.  _Only laughter_.  Sebastian was sure he’d never seen her laugh like that.

She buried her face in his shoulder and helplessly giggled and he snorted, before breaking into a chuckle, himself.  After a few moments spent in hilarity they picked themselves up, Sebastian tending to the mess he’d inadvertently made, folded the bedlinens and their own bedrolls into a pallet.  With the makeshift bed remade, they curled up next to the hearth, facing each other, his leg thrown over hers to keep her close. 

“We’ll owe the innkeeper a sovereign or two.”  He murmured after a slow, nibbling kiss.

“Not sure that bed was worth a copper, much less a sovereign.  Plus now she’s got a nice load of kindling.”  Aeryn giggled again and Sebastian traced the curve of her jaw with a careful finger.

“I’d break every bed between here and Starkhaven to hear you laugh like that again.”

Aeryn stroked his cheekbone and smiled up into his bright eyes.  _So sweet, this man of mine._ “Not necessary.  But I do appreciate the offer.”  She wriggled trying to find a slightly less hard spot on the floor.  “Anyway, then we’d be _paying_ to sleep on the ground and forgive me if I find that a bit wasteful.”  Yawning again, she pressed a kiss to his jaw before rolling over and pressing her chilled back to his gloriously warm chest.

She was held fast in his arms and they listened to the night sounds as the inn settled and stilled.  A cow in the yard bellowed and there was a clang as a heavy gate somewhere swung shut.  An owl roosting in the inn’s rafters gave a low call as it began its evening hunt. 

 

 


	23. Chapter 23

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _This chapter begins the Legacy section, so there will be occasional in-game dialogue, situations, and characters. It does not, however, follow the exact same path given Varric's penchant for exaggeration, embellishments and covering up when his heroes falter. Thanks to jillyfae for her insights and encouragement!_

Aeryn woke first.  They'd shifted in the night trying to find more comfortable spots on their makeshift pallet.  Sebastian had finally sprawled on his stomach with his leg draped over hers and she had to move slowly to slide out without disturbing him.  

On silent feet, she padded across the board floor, smooth with age and the tread of a hundred boarders, to peer out of the small window, clouded by frost and dingy in the corners from a lackadaisical cleaning.  The sky was still dark and the sun hadn't crept over the horizon yet but Aeryn could see heavy clouds clotting the view. 

The tray was on the small side table where he'd placed it last night and Aeryn nibbled at a slice of bread, still fluffy under the stale bit where the air touched.  The cheese was fine once she pared away dry rind with a tiny knife.  Who knew when she'd have a chance to eat properly,  as the idea of sitting down to table without Sebastian was less appetizing this morning than it had been last night.  The tea was stewed beyond even her ability to be practical and not waste, she decided, but there was water in the pitcher and she washed down the meal with that instead. 

She stretched her back and then went about loosening up the rest of her, quietly going through her morning routine.  Sebastian was still sound asleep when she finished.  A clunk at the door indicated that the maid had set out the promised fresh water and after waiting until her footsteps faded away, Aeryn cautiously stuck her head out of the door and brought it in.  It wouldn’t be the worst thing if someone saw her in Sebastian’s room, she could certainly play ‘guard with benefits’, but better that she be thought merely a sell-sword. 

Refreshed, she went back to his side and sat tailor-fashioned at his hip to wake him as gently as she could.  She ran her fingers through the curling russet hair behind his ear, then followed the line of his tanned neck and traced down his spine and over his lean, taut waist admiringly.  Maker, he was well-put together.  For a moment she lost herself in the feel of him under her fingers.

From a pleasant dream, Sebastian stirred, arching up against the hand stroking softly against the small of his back, fingers dallying in the faint whorl of hair at the base of his spine. “Hmm?”

  
Aeryn’s voice, sweet and low greeted him, “Morning.”

He cracked an eye open to see her crooked smile.  “G’d morning to you, too.”

  
Her questing hand smoothed over the curve of his arse and fondled, tracing the crease of his thighs and he sighed and smiled at the touch; the simple, sacred familiarity of it.

  
Aeryn shifted to press her mouth along his shoulder blade, mapping the faintly raised line of an old scar there, paler against the gold of his skin. His skin tasted of sleep and musk and it was delicious, smoothed like satin stretched across the frame of muscle and bone. “Missed you,” she murmured into the fur in his armpit, making him chuckle.

  
“Did I go somewhere in the night, then?”

  
Her voice was faint when she answered, “No, just on the ship. I missed this part the most, waking up, knowing you’d be there.”

  
Sebastian knew she wasn’t asking for one, but he apologized again, anyway. “I am sorry. I thought…”

Aeryn leaned over to stop him, stealing the words from his mouth with her own while her hands framed his jaw, fingertips stroking lightly down the plane of his throat, catching delightfully on the stubble of his beard **.**

He pushed himself up on his elbows to meet her, curving his hand around her waist.  "Is the sun up?"

  
"I don't think we'll see much of it today anyway, but no.  It's early yet."

He raised his eyebrow.  "Ah.”

He cut his eyes almost shyly, but it was the smug smile edging his lips that made her want to chase it.  "Vanity is a sin, serah," she teased.

"And love and the time to share it are blessings beyond measure."

“Is it love you want to school me in, then?” she asked archly as she casually dragged her short blunt nails up his arm, making him twitch.

“You've never needed a lesson there, _à ruin_."  His solemn words distracted her and she wasn't quite expecting the pounce that rolled her under him, playfully.  His cock, firm as iron, throbbed between them and she slipped her hand down, smirking at his groan and the feel of him; velvety, hot and stone hard against her fingers.

“Well.  You’ve been dreaming of interesting things, darling.”

“Let me share it?” He nuzzled into her neck and the beard scraping along her collarbone made her squirm and laugh.

“Oh, I could be persuaded, I think.” She wrapped her legs around his and, borrowing a fight move pressing _there_ and …just… _there_ , flipped him onto his back. 

 The air left him in a grunt, “Oof.  You’re a bit of a ruffian, did anyone ever tell you?” 

Aeryn slid farther down his thighs until her breasts pressed on either side of his cock, soft and inviting. “Aww, feeling mistreated? Poor sweet prince.”

Cool fingers brushed his sac and trailed, ghost-like along sensitive skin and then a firm stroke made his hips jerk as she licked a stripe up the underside of his shaft. 

“Not in the…. _Maker_ …least.”  Her head bobbed up and Aeryn gave him a wickedly delighted grin, with plumped, wet pink lips.  Sebastian hooked his hands under her arms to drag her body, lithe and firm, back up his.  “Come here.”  He sucked her lower lip, licking in to taste her with a need that flared in him like a brand when she moaned as he rolled her nipple between his fingers.  In a few moments she was arching against him and he tipped them back over with his hands under her lovely backside, caressing the heated, invitingly wet folds.   

Aeryn gathered him to her, spreading her thighs to take him and then twining her legs with his again to feel the strength in his thighs.  The muscle in his shoulders bunching and loosening under her hands as he worked.  Power and control and the slow sweet build of pleasure, throbbing through her cunt as he sucked marks down the column of her throat. 

When he leaned back to get a breath, she leaned up and tongued his nipple then nipped and Sebastian grunted as his hips snapped in reaction.  “ _Aeryn_ …”

“Yes…oh, come on…” All Sebastian’s intentions of a bit of leisurely morning pleasure flew out the window as her hands urged him faster, clever wicked little fingers stroking and sliding and her hot mouth on his skin and her tongue along his ear and her soft, low sob and in a rush of heat he was coming, cock pulsing into her soaking, clutching sheath.

He leaned his head against her shoulder a few moments later, “Y’’do know how to get a man’s heart started in the morning, _mo chridhe_.”

Chuckling, as her heart slowed and a ripple of lingering climax shuddered through her, Aeryn kissed his ear.  “T’was my pleasure, love.”  She shifted, hugging him with her thighs clasped around his hips and her arms around his back.  “Are you ready to get up and about?”

“Not particularly.”  He traced the line of her collarbone with a tickling kiss, looking up at her with pleading blue eyes and she smacked his arse.  He gave a disgruntled grunt, “Hmmph.  Ruffian.

“Yeah, that’s me and you knew it long ago.  Up you get, lazy, we’ve a good distance to travel today.”

“Slave driver.”  But he rolled off her and up to sit back on his heels before he stood. 

Aeryn gave a slow smile at the way the morning light through the open shutters played across his lean body, his cock soft against his thigh.  Sebastian stretched with a groan, long arms allowing his hands to brush the low ceiling.  He grimaced at the cobwebs on his fingertips before dusting them off, fastidiously.  “Isabela could have pointed us to somewhere a little nicer.”

With a shrug, she held out her hand and he tugged her to her feet.  “It has good ale and decent food and the sheets, at least, were reasonably fresh.  Those are rare enough in an inn that we wouldn’t draw attention in.  Come on, you’ve time to stretch before you go down for breakfast.”

00000

Sebastian stepped behind the curtain to take advantage of the privy  after his morning stretch and a bit of prayer.  When he came back, Aeryn had vanished from the room, taking the tray that they’d forgotten with her.  He finished dressing quickly and grabbed his pack.  Fenris was waiting, leaned against the wall.

“I trust the furniture is tidily piled, at least?”

“What’s left of it.”  Sebastian acknowledged Fenris’ wry smile with an abashed grin as the two walked down the stairs. 

 

Aeryn was back in full guard mode, standing next to the kitchen pass through with shuttered eyes and her hair tightly pulled back again.  Stubborn, flyaway wisps were already escaping to be shoved back with an impatient hand as she wolfed down a bit of brown bread and butter.  A streak of grease shone on her forehead and caught a few strands of hair. 

Sebastian thanked the innkeeper and dropped a small pouch on the counter in front of her.  “Sorry about the bed.  I’m a bit heavier than I used to be, I suppose.” He did his best to sound dismayed at the idea and ignored the elvhen maid hiding a nervous smile as she scrubbed the entry way floor. 

The plump woman blinked as she counted out the silver, just at a sovereign as Aeryn had warned him against being memorably generous.  “Ah, well, messere, it happens.  And I’m sure and I saw some woodworm dust when I cleaned up in there last week. You’re very kind to consider the cost.”

Varric and Bethany left as Sebastian finished his breakfast, a surprisingly fresh berry pudding and coddled eggs.  Fenris had much the same but Aeryn was busy checking over their supplies and apparently was satisfied with her snack. 

They’d arranged that Varric and Bethany would head directly north after purchasing a few more supplies in the early market and that he, Aeryn and Fenris would head towards Kirkwall, then turn north a mile or so further on, taking a sheltered path that Fenris recalled from a prior guard job.  They expected to meet on the northern road within a couple of hours, barring difficulty and Sebastian silently prayed as he watched the two set out, from his place at table, waiting impatiently for Aeryn to be done with her inventory so that they could be away from Markham and out of sight enough that the acting could be set aside. 

 

 

 

It took three hours, instead of two, when they had to backtrack around a massive boulderslide, but they still managed to meet Varric and Bethany on the road in time for lunch. 

After they’d eaten the rolls and sausage packed at the inn, Bethany watched Aeryn comb out her hair.  “I’ll braid it.  If you want.”  She offered hesitantly.  Aeryn handed her the comb and sat down at her feet without so much as a word.  But she leaned back against Bethany’s knees.

Bethany’s nimble fingers worked quickly while Aeryn munched on an apple that Sebastian had tossed her with that glare of his that told her he thought she’d been neglecting herself again. 

When her sister’s hair was tidy, Bethany leaned over and laid her own head on top of Aeryn’s.  After just a second, Aeryn reached up and squeezed Bethany’s hand.  “Varric was telling me a little about the Deep Roads.” 

“Was he?” Her eyes tracked on Varric, who gave her a smirk.

“I didn’t even know you got locked in, Aeryn.”  Bethany kept her voice neutral. “That’s why you took so long to come home.  Back to Kirkwall,” she amended.

“Yeah. I didn’t want to make a big deal of it to Mother, you know?  I just let her think it had taken us longer than we thought it would.”

“I wish I’d come.”

Sebastian saw Aeryn shake her head, just a little and then she haltingly answered, toying with a pile of pebbles between her knees on the ground, “It was pretty bad, Beth.  I was thankful you were with Mother.  She’d have been frantic, otherwise.  I thought we were going to…I was glad she wasn’t going to lose us both.”

“But you didn’t…you came through. I’d have been fine, too.” 

Aeryn  balanced a grey pebble on a flat black one and closed her eyes trying not to remember how dark, how hot, how drained and starved they’d been after that last big fight against the pride demon.

 How Anders had been trembling as he waited to build up enough mana for another restoration spell or enough to start a fire to boil the water they found, dripping through cracks in the stone.  How Fenris had tried to brighten the gloom in the secondary tunnel they’d taken back to the surface with a flash of lyrium now and again, each time shorter and fainter.  How hoarse Varric had been, telling foolish tales over again to keep them from dwelling too much.  And it had been an endless week to the surface and nothing to do about it but put one foot in front of the other or lie down and die with pockets full of gold and jewels, just another pile of bones littered with easy pickings to clutter up the Free Marches.

 She took the last bite of her apple, juice bursting bright and tart on her tongue and chasing off the memory.  Looking up at Sebastian, his eyes were clear and blue and steady on hers.  She pulled up a smile and leaned back to look at Bethany.  “It was a mess, Bethany.  We could have used you.” And the slight flare of pride in her sister’s warm eyes was worth the small fib.

Sebastian mused as he restrung his bow.  He could close his eyes and remember how she’d looked when she came back to find Bethany gone; skeletally thin, sickly pale, and eyes blazing with a frightening madness lurking just behind the icy grey.

Varric added, his tone unusually grave, “It was pretty damn close, Sunshine.  And that demon…if we hadn’t found the key…well, it would have been a much shorter story.”  He chuckled, weakly and fingered one of the keys that wound Bianca tight. “Hawke kept us going, though.  Bolstered us up, sang us a song, managed to make mushrooms taste like…well, dirt.  But reasonably tasty dirt, anyway.”

Aeryn narrowed her eyes at him.  She didn’t recall much from that last week, other than being too hot and shaking anyway and not being able to close her eyes for fear of what would find her in the Fade.  Anders and Fenris had finally ended up pressed on either side of her, glaring at each other and promising to keep her from sleeping too deeply, so long as she rested.  She hadn’t, but she had appreciated their efforts.  Later.  She stood, with a final squeeze to Bethany’s hand. 

“We should keep moving if we intend to make the foothills by dark.”  Fenris was watching Hawke as she laid her hand on Sebastian’s shoulder and the archer covered it with his own, clearly a comfort shared.   

Her memory of those last few days was still faulty, Fenris thought.  Just as well.  She hadn’t seemed too upset at first, but the longer the trip to the surface had taken the quieter she’d become, performing tasks in a mindless fog.   When they’d had to rest and the mage had risked her temper to check her temperature, she’d been burning  with fever from a wound she’d ignored.  They’d been terrified she’d contracted the Blight.  The abomination had nearly led them back into the Deep Roads, trying to find the Wardens he swore would be there, to offer her a chance.  She’d threatened to slit his throat if he tried. 

_Perhaps they’d have been better off if_ … Fenris bit the thought off.  No.  Even if Hawke had not had the Blight illness, the mage had saved her life more than once.  And his own, too, if Fenris was honest. He could be honest.  The abomination was imprisoned in the duty the man had feared.  Fenris was free, here with Hawke and Sebastian, Varric and…Bethany, on the cusp of a battle that would return Sebastian to his home and rightful place.

 And then?   Then Fenris would have to decide his own road.  _Hmm._  He offered Bethany his hand and after a surprised smile, she took it and stood.

Varric raised his eyebrow at Fenris, but the elf just smirked.

000000000

 

As dawn cleared the edge of the Vimmark Wastes, they looked down into the canyon that stretched before them.   The trip had taken just over a day and a half of hard marching and they’d camped at a stream, deciding to leave the last bit for the morning.  It had been enough to keep them out of reach of any one camped down behind the walls they could see stretching in the distance, showing clear signs of dwarven make and recent habitation, including a trace of smoke. 

Aeryn led the way, hesitantly, into the canyon.   Her skin itched.  There was a deep chill in the bone dry air and dust settled on their clothes whenever the wind stilled for a moment. 

Not only that.  She could feel eyes on her.  At the first marker, she stopped to read.  “A prison.  Well.  _Lovely_.  Good place for a prison, too.”

Sebastian took advantage of the break to rub his hand along the back of her neck and looked up at the grim sky that opened over the jagged crack in the earth. 

“See anything?” Out of all of them, Sebastian had height and better far-sight. 

He shielded his eyes and watched for a moment.  “There’s definitely someone over there, a good sized force I’d say given the number of fires they’ve just doused and what movement I can see. Twenty at the least, but not more than fifty.”

She cocked her head and listened.  On the breeze she could hear voices, calling others to arms. 

Behind her, Fenris’ sword left its sheath with the familiar sliding _shush_.  Oh good, it wasn’t her imagination.  Adrenaline gathered bitterly on her tongue. 

“Are we ready, then?”  He came up beside them and Aeryn saw that, Fenris at least, was spoiling for a fight.  “Let us show these fools the dangers of interfering with our plans, shall we?” 

Aeryn grinned wolfishly at Fenris  and Sebastian let his hand drop.  He could feel her attention shift away from him towards the fight to come, focused and dangerous and so set himself to the same task.

 

000000

They rested a minute, in the shade and windbreak of the tattered building, the wood siding starting to flake with age and a few boards flapping in the never-ending breeze.  Varric arranged the limbs of the man he’d spoken to like an old friend before they’d had to fight him and covered his corpse with a ratty blanket pulled from a nearby cot.

As Fenris  and Sebastian went through the loot with Bethany,  Aeryn asked, “This was the fellow who built Bianca?”

For a minute, she thought Varric wouldn’t answer her but he nodded, at last.  “Yeah.”

“You ever going to tell me that one?”

“Not today, Hawke.”  Her old friend sounded tired.

She leaned into him for a moment, and he patted her on the hip. “Alright.  Well.  That’s that, I guess.  If we head back now, we can probably get to that creek we passed on the way in.”

“What?  You mean to leave, now?”  Fenris looked up from a pile of swords he was sorting with a frown.

“Well, I don’t see a real reason to stay.  It’s clear they’re all lyrium mad.”

Sebastian frowned at her, as well. “But…Aeryn, they were talking about demons.  Do we not have an obligation to see it cleared out?”

Spinning on her heel, she waved her hands.  “It’s a bloody prison!  Who are the demons bothering out here?  I…we can send a message to one of the guard companies.  Varric, you could get a note to Aveline, now, don’t you think?  Or the Wardens.”

Bethany asked, “He was talking about Father, though.  Aren’t you interested in…”

Aeryn cut her off with a shrug.  “Not enough to risk all of our lives on something I don’t understand.  I don’t think the Carta’s coming back for us after this.”

“I think it would be safe enough to investigate this building, Aeryn.  Maybe we can find out what they were referring to.” Aeryn’s chin was mulish, her eyes hooded and Sebastian was tempted to back down, but it bothered him immensely that she was willing to turn her back on this threat.  “I think we should keep going.”

“As do I.”  Fenris agreed.

“I just want to find out if Father was really here.”

“Not to mention, they were pretty well stocked, Hawke.  We could pick up a little spending money.  It’ll help us keep a low profile on the road north, if we don’t have to pull from the Fereldan marked coin we’ve got on us.”

Aeryn scuffed her foot and glanced down the shadowy hall.  Dust motes sparkled in the light from the torches Bethany had lit.  “Fine.  We’ll check out this next couple of rooms, crack a couple of chests.  But I’m not going any farther in than that.  We need to get back on the road.”

She led out on point and Varric watched for a moment as Sunshine and Broody followed her.  The tall man beside him let a weary sigh escape and he glanced up.  “You have any idea what’s going on?”

Sebastian grimaced, and ran fingers through his hair mussing his normally neat appearance.  “No.  She’s not chosen to let me in on what she’s so concerned about.  I’d not thought to see her want to turn away from a fight like this.”

He slid the longbow over his shoulder and Varric checked that Bianca was secure before they continued.  “I don’t think it’s the fight, Charming.”

“No?”

“She’s worried for us, not for her.  And I’m pretty used to Hawke not caring if she takes a wound or two on a feint, but she won’t usually completely turn her back on an armed enemy.”

Sebastian shook his head, “If I ask again, she’s going to call me a nag and try to distract me.  And between you and me, she generally can.”  Varric chuckled.  “Charming, eh?” Vael’s eyebrow was arched, but he was smiling so Varric shrugged. 

“Haven’t come up with a better one, yet.  If you’re keeping up with Hawke, clearly Choir Boy doesn’t fit anymore. Give me time.”

“I’m a bit afraid to see what you come up with next.”  They strode out to catch up with the rest.

The rooms in the guard tower wound around, filled with traps and another pack of Carta. Aeryn had to admit the gold and gear they found was worth the extra effort, though.

It was fun, really.   The dwarves were a challenge after too long a break between fights, well-armed and skilled against the practiced assault of her merry band.  Bethany had stepped up nicely to fill in for Merrill. The force spells that she’d made her specialty almost as effective as the elf’s vines to gather the enemy in confusion and allow Sebastian and Varric to pick them off, even in the enclosed space. 

Aeryn paused for a moment in the shadows to catch her breath and to watch her sister’s technique.  Bethany stood in solid stance, the ebb and flow of her mana whirling her hair in a dark cloud, her hands shaping and flexing as she cast.  Calm and methodical, but with an edge to it as if she’d finally come to enjoy the power she wielded.  No hesitation, no worried glance around to see if anyone had seen her. 

If the Circle had done nothing else but force that confidence on her, then perhaps it hadn’t been a poor choice on Bethany’s part. 

Fenris slammed a dwarf into her path, and she neatly dispatched him.  “Tired, already?”  He smirked at her from beneath his bright hair. 

“Just letting you catch up!” 

 The Carta stood their ground, though, and managed a surprise or two.  They’d even employed a mage for Aeryn to sneak around and surprise from the shadows, which made her wonder.  An apostate, if his robes were anything to go by.  But well-trained.  He’d been fast enough to get in a bone-chilling cold spell before the magebane had snaked through his veins.   Now how had they managed to find someone like that and drag them into their little cult? 

Varric took the bolts she handed him, in another brief pause to regroup.  “I’m starting to wonder how this bunch even found you, Hawke.  I mean, yeah, they’re well trained, but they don’t seem to have the brains to track you down.”

Despite the fact that she’d been wondering along similar lines, she asked, “Does it matter, Varric?”

“Damn it, Hawke.  They’re trying to kill you.  And _Sunshine_.  Of course it matters.”  Was it guilt on his face?

“It’s not your fault, you know.”

He shook his head, “I’m wondering if that’s how Gerav got involved, finding you through me.”

“Even if it was, it’s not your fault he was here.  Anyway, he was raving as much as the rest of them.”  She eyed him curiously.  “Now, really, what?”

“Never known you to turn your back on trouble, is all.  We’re all wondering, but your beau is worried you’ll think he’s a nag.” Vael had caught his eye a moment before and the others had followed him into the next room, to give the dwarf a chance to feel Hawke out.

“He is, just a little.”  Her face softened and Varric waited for the lover’s moment to pass.  “But, it’s…something is _wrong_ here, Varric.  Something I don’t think I can fix…something dangerous.  Magic or…worse, the sort of thing my father warned me to avoid at all costs.  I can feel it on the back of my neck.”

“ _Hawke felt the oppressive hand of danger and charged towards it, fully armed_ is how I’d usually write that,” he reminded her.

Aeryn didn’t return his rakish grin, though.  “Not a hand.  Like a….collar.  Or a noose.”  Her hand strayed to her throat, involuntarily.  “Like I half know something…something I heard when I was drunk or asleep.”

“Heh.  I’ve heard you repeat a story word for word when I would have sworn you were passed out cold drunk.”

Her smirk faded too quickly for any comfort. “Yeah.  I don’t know.  I can’t explain it.  So I haven’t tried.  No sense when I know you’re all right and we should take care of this, but I still…don’t _want_ to.”

She shook herself and Varric had to resist the urge to do the same.  Hawke wasn’t superstitious.  If she was feeling trouble, then there _was_ trouble.  But they were almost done here.  They couldn’t go much farther without being underground.

He said as much and the woman in front of him wrinkled her nose in a manner wholly unfitting an assassin.  “Well, let’s try to avoid that, by all means. I’ve seen all of the Deep Roads I intend to.” 

Steel rang, along with Fenris’ challenge and Sebastian’s voice called back, “Aeryn!”  They ran to join the new fight.

 

With a thrust and a following twist, Aeryn slid her slim dragonbone dagger through another ribcage that felt like it was made of stone. The last of the dwarves fell, and she turned back to the first one she’d taken out on the platform, his stout body curled protectively around something.  He’d been scrabbling in a chest when they came upon the most recent set of assassins.  Aeryn had cut his throat from behind, and, now, knelt beside him to see what he’d been hiding. 

Hopefully it was something useful, like a journal that would give some explanation of what this lot of babbling dust addled dwarves thought they were up to.

She hesitated, upon seeing what was under him.  His dead hands fell slackly away from a small round object, red and silver and pulsing like a terrified heart.  “What in the world…” Almost against her will, her fingers crept forward to brush the oddly warm surface.

There was a rush and a tickle of magic sliding up her arm and she gasped, drawing the attention of her companions. 

“Aeryn?  Sebastian heard her choke, and turned quickly from where he and Fenris had been sorting through the last chest.  “What did you find?”   Her eyes were wide, even in the gloom.  She almost looked scared. 

“N…nothing.  Just a …a knife.”

“That’s a wicked looking thing.”  He eyed it. The hilt was fitted to her hand, but the blade was jagged and wide.  It was bound with a dark red cloth, familiar somehow.  Aeryn was looking at it like it was a particularly venomous snake.  “Will you keep it, then?” 

“I…guess I’d better.  It’s got some runes on it I’d like to look at later.”  She shoved it into her pack and rolled back up to her feet.  “C’mon.  We’ll look a little farther, but they seemed to be getting their directions from this fellow.  Varric, see what you make of this.”  She handed Varric another of the notes, written in a merchant’s shorthand.

He read it to the others while Aeryn leaned against the paneled wall, trying not to shake.

The notes were…black Void, she wanted to _know_ what these bloody Carta fools were up to, why there was Warden gear mixed in with the gold, and now there was this…thing.  This dagger that hadn’t been a dagger until she’d touched it.  And the way it… _whispered_ …at the edge of her consciousness as if it were pushing her forward.  

She knew that voice.

That was the voice of comfort, of reason.   Of stories and songs and lessons, from a time when she wasn’t the only one, fallible and insufficient, between her family and it’s destruction.

 It had never made her afraid, before. 

But the last time she’d heard it, she hadn’t had a reason to be ashamed before him, either.  The last time she heard it, it had been cracked and weak, begging her to keep them safe and she had promised. Now, Carver and Mother were dead and Bethany had gone to the Circle rather than trust in Aeryn.  Now, she’d been the death of countless mages.  She’d helped fuel a war between mages and Templars.  She’d practically painted a target on the Hawke name.

And… _no, stop, this isn’t helping.  Just shove it back.  Get out and find some deep hole to bury this blighted thing in and get everyone as far away from here as possible.  Whatever’s here, whatever Father found here, can’t hurt them if you get them away._ Aeryn shook herself, ignoring Fenris’ questioning glance and looked up at Bethany who had asked Varric’s help in popping open the small chest she had found. 

There was one more chamber, a wide hall perhaps, just past this last flight of stairs.  Aeryn could see a good sized chest against the farthest wall and while size didn’t always mean a quality haul, there probably wasn’t too much harm in checking it out.  One more chest.  And then they should go.

She gave a glance to the griffon statue at the side of the doorway and then stepped across the threshold stumbling as something unwelcome and unfamiliar slid against her skin as if the very air around her had turned thick as honey, every hair in her body standing up.

“Oh, sodding  _Void_!”

The magic that had trembled around her felt like rock against her shoulders when she tried to scramble backwards and at her exclamation, Sebastian lurched forward to try and catch her and stumbled himself and Fenris charged ahead to meet whatever had caught her. “NO! Wait!”

  
Too late. They’d already crossed. Fenris swore as he felt the effect of the barrier spell itch along his markings.

“What is this?” Sebastian offered her a hand and she grasped it, to haul herself off the dusty stone floor.

She saw Bethany and Varric running towards them.  “Beth, stop!”  Aeryn managed to make her sister stop at least, Varric setting a staying hand on her arm. “Do you see a…a glyph or anything on your side?  There’s some sort of spell, a barrier, protection or something.”

“Let me look.” 

They waited, while Bethany and Varric scoured the doorframe and the floor, then widened their search when no trigger appeared.  After a few fruitless minutes, she shook her head, “There’s nothing, Aeryn.  It doesn’t feel like magic, over here.  Are you sure?”

“Pretty sure.”

Fenris shoved against what looked like clear air as Aeryn tried wiggling the thin edge of her dagger through the wooden frame, but it didn’t even chip the wood.  Sebastian examined the surround for triggers on their side.  Fenris gave up in disgust, “It seems we are trapped.” 

“We could try knocking through the wall?”  Sebastian suggested doubtfully, picking at the mortar between two close set stones with the tip of his belt knife. 

“Go farther in.”  Bethany drew herself up.  “I might be able to break you out.”  Hurriedly, they backed up into the next room while Bethany focused on the weak point Varric showed her.  The spell slammed forward with a gust of wind that rushed, sending paper and the tapestries flapping, but it made no dent in the stone.  One of Varric’s explosive bolts left soot marks, but was just as ineffective.

“Maybe if we had some of that Qunari blasting powder, Hawke.”

“Going to go shake down a Sten for me, Varric?”  Aeryn gave a little half grin at his chuckle.  “There’s nothing for it but to just go forward, I guess.  You and Bethany can…”

Bethany cut her off, “Bethany is about to come and join you.  If there are more of those Carta down there, you’ll need me.”

“Beth…”

This time it was Sebastian who cut her off, touching her shoulder.  “She’s right, Aeryn.  It’s not a good idea to separate.  Odds are we’ll find another exit or a better weak point a bit farther on.”

Aeryn rubbed her forehead.  They were all determined to keep going.  Maker knew she couldn’t _force_ Bethany not to follow them through the barrier.  And it grated on her nerves to think of Varric and Bethany wandering alone out to find help.  Help from where?  Not Kirkwall.  Too far from Starkhaven to get a hold of Laird Robard, either, even if the ship had made port in Hercina as planned.  “Sure.  Right past the two dozen profane, the regenerating shades, and the flaming pride demon. It’s a sodding _prison_ , remember?”  None of them seemed to remember that. 

She couldn’t forget.

Fenris and Varric exchanged looks of commiseration through the barrier as she looked across the hall.  It was no different than the room they were in, stone and rubble.  Well, if there was rubble perhaps there _were_ weak points to exploit.  Finally, Aeryn sighed. “All right. Fine, come on. Varric?”

“Oh, I’m with you, Hawke.”  He slung Bianca back across his shoulder as he followed Bethany through the barrier with a shiver.  “Can’t let you do a dungeon crawl without me.  Hey, at least we didn’t find an idol that drives people insane, this time.”

Aeryn forced a smile and turning away from them, stared down into the dank, dark hall.  Her father whispered something she couldn’t quite hear in the back of her mind.  “Ah, right.  Yeah.  Let’s be grateful for small favors.” 

 

 

 

 

 

 


	24. Chapter 24

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Continuing the Legacy storyline, so some game dialogue may appear but there are also variations on the storyline to account for Varric's creative license! Thanks again to jillyfae for her advice and cheerleading!_

 

Aeryn stopped a few steps into the next room, feeling like the steel toes of her boots had turned to lead. 

She couldn't do this.

It was too dangerous.  They were trapped in here and this dagger was talking to her in her dead father's voice.  And that was if she was  _lucky_.  She had to tell them.

"I..."

Fenris was closest, stalking at her side, and pulled up beside her.  Whatever he saw on her face made his eyes widen and he grasped her upper arm to lend his strength and his presence.  "Hawke?"

Was it just her own reluctance or something else that made her stammer? "I can't, I need to tell you..."  

"Aeryn?"  Sebastian had seen Fenris grab her and realizing there was some trouble he stepped up closer.  

"There's something wrong with m...."  She almost had it out when she caught the movement out of the corner of her eye. "Move!"  Aeryn shoved Fenris off and crowded Sebastian back out of the charge of the hulking creature.  _Too slow.  Not strong enough_ , she barely staggered him back in time.

Behind her she could hear Sebastian's whispered, "Merciful Andraste" as the darkspawn slammed over her, forcing her into a backflip and a roll. She came up with weapons drawn, forcing away the repeating jabber of her father's whispers.  She slammed a tar bomb into the face of the one on top of her, fouling its vision enough to evade its grasping claws. 

A stench of rot rose up off the beast's hide, too familiar, though it didn't look like any darkspawn Aeryn had ever seen before.  Bigger, even more grotesque she’d think later when she had a moment to catalog.  Now, now there was a weak point to find as Bethany’s force spell slammed another hurlock across the room and Varric and Sebastian scrambling for room to fight while Fenris flared in front of them, driving a couple of genlocks… _maybe_ genlocks…back from the brutal light of his lyrium.

Right into a braced Aeryn, who broke the jaw of the first one and jammed a throwing knife into the back of the other’s knee as she spun.  Fenris finished him off with a scything blow as Bethany lodged ice spikes across the door.  Varric and Sebastian stood behind that wall to pick off the three trapped creatures in the next room.

Panting, she took a moment to catch her breath, ease the rattling thump of her heart against her ribs and shove down the panic that threatened to claw its way up her throat.  The door was shut behind them. 

Closing her eyes, she could see the residual flare of fireballs on the backs of her lids. 

Opening her eyes didn’t stop the memory of screams, of cruel harsh laughter, of the stench of death and mud and Carver calling… _No.  No, not now_.  Ruthlessly, she slammed the lid shut on those old fears only to have her father’s voice rumble, soothing and terrifying in one whispering whole. 

Maybe she shouldn’t say anything.  Maybe thinking she should had called up the darkspawn _.  No.  No Father wouldn’t have done that._

She took another breath, trying to clear her mind, bring herself back to the present and out of the traps of the past.  Too much time lazing around on boats, dancing in palaces, dallying with Sebastian and not enough fighting.  She was out of shape, mentally and physically.   For one dizzying moment, she scrabbled for a footing in her own head. 

Sebastian turned back into the room to see her staring at the floor, blankly.  “Aeryn?”

She ignored him, shaking her head as if she were arguing with herself. 

“Aeryn, are you well?”  He had his hands on her now, but her eyes were unfocused, her face completely empty and Sebastian’s gut clenched as Fenris turned back to his partner. 

“Hawke!”  The elf’s voice snapped and she suddenly shook herself and turned to him, shadows flickering around her feet for just an instant.

“Everyone alright?”  Curious worry  written on her mobile features as if nothing stranger than a darkspawn attack had occurred.

 Bethany was at Aeryn’s side, checking her for wounds and casting a worried look at Sebastian who had released Aeryn but was hovering, still.

“Other than needing a damn nerve tonic, fine.  How is anything that big so sneaky?” Varric assured her.

Fenris nodded, and turned back to the darkspawn with the knowledge that Hawke preferred to have those odd turns ignored.  Sebastian was unlikely to do so, though.  So he busied himself yanking Aeryn’s throwing knife out of the corpse and wiping it off against the ragged garment it wore, trying to give them a moment of privacy. 

“Was it the darkspawn? Is that what’s wrong?”

She shook her head.  “No.  I…wipe your face, love.”  There was a spatter of gore near his left eye and she waited until he’d cleaned it away.  “There’s something…else.” 

Something worse than darkspawn from the way she closed her eyes and shook herself, again.  Sebastian dampened the rag he’d just used to clean his own face and gently removed the evidence of the fight from her countenance as well.  “Tell me.”

Sebastian’s voice was warm and rich and clear, and she locked on it, ignoring the deeper resonant tones she wasn’t sure she was imagining in her own skull and the lingering echoes.  She’d told him her nightmares.  Surely this wasn’t worse.  No reason to let paranoia take her.   “I’m hearing voices.”

“What?”

“Well, _a_ voice.  Father’s voice.  Since I picked up that dagger.” 

“Father’s voice?” Bethany echoed, weakly.

“That thing you picked up in the other room?”  She nodded and Sebastian reached for her pack, but before he could pull the dagger out, she stopped him.

“Wait…we don’t…don’t touch it, just in case it’s...  Let me.”  She pulled out the bizarre artifact and set it on the ground, so that they could see. 

Varric knelt beside it and shook his head.  “Never seen anything like that, Hawke.  Flaming thing looks as likely to cut you as your victim.”

Bethany was watching Aeryn, though.  “Can you still hear him?” When Aeryn nodded again, she asked a little wistfully, “What does he sound like?”

“Same as always…like the voice of the Maker.”  Sebastian choked a little and Aeryn gave him a wan smile.  “That’s what Mother always used to say.  He…it’s a deep voice.  All authority and command and confidence.” 

“And what is that voice telling you?”  Leave it to Fenris to ask that as he and Varric exchanged glances.

“It’s just…nonsense.  I can’t really tell but,” She looked up to Sebastian and something in her eyes made him want to pull her to him, but she closed them and then looked away.  “I’ve been trying not to listen.  I don’t…maybe I just want to hear him.”

Her father.  Sebastian wished for just a moment he was the one hearing the man’s voice.  He had a bone or two to pick with Malcolm Hawke.

Aeryn hated it, hated admitting the weakness and instead shoved that away too and pulled herself up and squared her shoulders.  “Okay.  So that’s the deal.  I don’t _think_ I’m under any influence, but I can’t be sure.  You’re going to have to keep an eye on me.”  Her eyes locked on Fenris and his narrowed for a moment, before he nodded. 

“As you wish, Hawke. Keep point for the moment.” He spoke and Sebastian turned, startled.

“What is this?”

Aeryn answered him, “We arranged a while ago…once we realized that ordinary people could be possessed by demons and not just mages.  Fenris is in charge.”  There was a slight hint of hurt in his eyes and she hastened to explain.  “It has nothing to do with you not being ready.  It’s just…if I _am_ possessed, love, if I turned on you?  Could you stop me? Honestly?”

Stop her?  “You mean…” Oh, Maker.  Could he?  Sebastian bowed his head, “I don’t know.”

“Fenris can and will. With all my gratitude.”  There was little of the lover in her look.  This was Aeryn assessing the strengths and weaknesses of her crew.  Sebastian was weak when it came to her.  And they both knew it.  He might be able to kill her, to keep her from being used, but he would hesitate.  Hesitation with someone with her skills and her speed backed by a demon’s strength and soulless intent, would be a deadly mistake.

He nodded.  “I…understand.  But, _leannan_ , I…”

The steel faded from her eyes, just a bit.  “It’s alright, Sebastian.  Just a precaution.  Father wouldn’t hurt _me.”_

 _Andraste, let it be so._   But he lacked her faith.

000000

Sebastian watched her closely as they advanced through the ancient prison, but Aeryn didn’t seem to slip back into the fugue.  She was alert and careful, leading them through the rooms with her usual aplomb even in the face of another attack. 

Releasing a trapped Shade a few rooms in also called forth an echoing voice, not ghostly at all and Aeryn turned a sickly color until she realized the rest of them heard it as well. 

“Is that what you’re hearing?”  Bethany asked her, eyes wide and her own voice hushed when Malcolm Hawke finished intoning. 

“Not exactly.  I still can’t tell what he’s saying.” 

Varric tried to lighten the mood, with a smirk. “Your father missed his calling.  Voice like that, he could have been a bard extraordinaire.”

Aeryn shot him a crooked smile of her own.  “He did sometimes, when I was little.  When we were between lodging or just getting settled.”

“I remember,” Bethany said.  “Mother would play the lute and he’d sing and you’d sing and juggle with him, sometimes.”

“I was not aware you had been a mummer, Hawke.”  Fenris hauled her to her feet, where she’d been sorting through a pile of shattered bones for a ring and a handful of silver.  No reason to leave it lie in the dusty tomb. 

“He gave me something to do so that I wouldn’t roam the crowd while they were distracted and pick pockets,” she chuckled as she took the water bottle Sebastian held out to her.  “Thanks, love.”

Sebastian couldn’t help but ask, “You sang with him?”

“Now and again.  I didn’t really care for all those folk staring at me.”  As if she’d summoned another shade with her incautious memory, she felt the hair rise on the back of her neck.  Catching Fenris’ eye, as he was closest, she jerked a chin to the door and silently, he stalked over to the threshold.

He let his eyes adjust to the gloom and then shrugged. “We seem to be alone, still.”

“Something’s out there, though.”  Or maybe she was just letting things get to her. 

“Perhaps.  We should move on if you all are ready.”  He agreed after a moment.  Aeryn led them out of the cell and back to the path, now trending downward, ominously deeper into the gloom.

 

A few moments later, they were staring in disbelief at a ghoul wearing what used to be spectacular Grey Warden armor and calling itself Larius.  _Oh, good.  Not paranoia then.  Hurrah._  

In a surprising firm voice, for all its wavering thought patterns, the ghoul mused, “Your sister seems to have inherited all of Malcolm’s magic, as well as his appearance.  I am surprised that the Key did not bind to her, instead.”

“My sister has better sense than to pick up strange glowing things.” Aeryn said drily.

That seemed to give Larius pause.  “Then perhaps there is something of your father in you, as well.”

Sebastian snorted, despite himself and Aeryn raised an eyebrow before she asked, “Look…all we want is out of here.  Can you show us?”  Probably not.  If it could, why would it not have escaped long ago.

The ghoul shook its head, solemnly.  “There is only one way out.  Break your father’s seals and open the prison.  Release and destroy Corypheus, the last of the magisters who corrupted the Golden City.”

“That’s impossible.”  Sebastian’s mind recoiled from the very idea.  “That was thousands of years ago.  There’s not…”

Aeryn disliked the way the thing focused on Sebastian and shifted slightly, picking out a rusted rent in the hauberk that would yield under her daggers.  But it spoke mildly, “The darkspawn do not age as we do and Corypheus is…something else again.  Immortal.  But not, I believe, indestructible.”

Small and sharp, a thought occurred to Sebastian.  A chance to destroy a magister.  To punish the one who corrupted the Maker’s Seat and doomed Thedas to a cycle of Blights that had nearly destroyed the world more than once.  The idea coiled in his gut, like a viper.   With that deed as his epithet, the Divine would be forced to recognize him as worthy of the Vael name and the throne.  It might make his task easier than the plans he had made. _Maker._ He started a small prayer for guidance.

Aeryn fidgeted in front of him, drawing his eye, the torchlight catching fire in her hair and glinting off the hilt of her daggers.

On her back.  On the backs of all his friends, but it would be Aeryn that led the way and bore the brunt. 

Was his pride worth her blood? 

“There must be another way.”  His voice was steady and Larius’ clouded eyes tracked on him again. 

“No, messere.  There are only the seals and the fight. The prison was built well and Malcolm Hawke only increased its effectiveness.  If you wish to escape, this is all there is.”

And there it was.  Not for his pride, but to get them all out safely it must be done. 

“Lead the way, then.  If there’s a fight, better now than later.”  Aeryn was answering after a glance back at her companions.

Larius indicated the massive structure in front of them.  “The first is this way.” 

The room was built around a raised circular dias, with pillars at four points.  She stopped at the edge, just before the step up.  Her father’s voice was suddenly insistent, pounding against the inside of her skull, but nothing he was saying made sense.  Common tongue, but the words were jibberish. 

There wasn’t a choice.  No way out behind them and the way forward sealed unless she did…whatever it was she needed to do.  Just stand in the circle and hold the Key out to one of the pillars, whichever one called her the most, Larius had said, just before he disappeared. 

Aeryn missed Anders, with an unexpected ache. He’d always given her good advice, outside of the…well. He’d have known if she could trust Larius or if the taint had made the former commander too mad and unstable to believe. 

Suddenly she turned back to Sebastian and set her fingers to his lips.  “Pray for me.”

It wasn’t a request.  He kissed her fingertips, then took her hand and kissed once more, just over where the tattoo sat, and bowed, holding her solemn gaze.  “I have’na stopped since the barrier shut behind us.”

Nodding, she turned and stepped resolutely to the center of the circle.  Gripping the hilt, she closed her eyes and slowly spun on her heel until her father’s voice was like a hornet’s nest in her ears.  She lifted the blade and… _“Unnnf”_

Her companions watched as her body went rigid and a stream of rich golden light connected the pillar and the blade.  Fenris stood at Sebastian’s elbow, despite the fact that he should be keeping watch on the approach as Varric was trying to do. 

Bethany, too, abandoned her lookout and gasped when, in fine threads, crimson began to infuse the light. “Oh, Maker.”

Sebastian froze next to Fenris as his markings flared hot and he growled, “Blood magic.”

“Shit.” Varric had abandoned his post.  “Should we…”

“No.”  Was that his voice?  So hard and forbidding? _Maker forgive me_.  “We have no choice.  We must get out of here, this is our only way out and Aeryn would not appreciate our interference, now, only to have to do it again.”  _Protect her.  Holy Andraste, your daughter is beset by danger.  She walks a dark path. Grant her strength._ And deeper than the prayer, a hard cold anger built.  _A blood mage.  Malcolm Hawke had been a blood mage, damn him to the Void.  Oh, Aeryn, anam chara, I’m so sorry._

Aeryn felt something like teeth sink through the thin leather of her gloves and into her skin, but it was too late to pull away _._ Endless moments passed, her father’s voice ringing around her in prayer.  Malcolm Hawke had not been a devout Andrastian, but he’d accepted the Chantry stories about the Maker, the origin of the Fade and demons.  If he’d been binding demons here, the prayer made sense.  The _prayer_ made _sense_.  But this was blood magic.  _Why?_

As suddenly as it began, it was over and she collapsed in a heap as the magic released her, her fingers burning and every bit of intuition pulling her to look to the corner as  a massive demon materialized, released with Father’s signature in her blood.

With something like gratitude she launched herself at it, ignoring the voices.  All of them, real or imagined, to take out her anger on the demon of pride.  Shadows reached for her and she wrapped herself in their smooth, cool depths. 

The demon exploding into their midst threw them all off their feet, distracting them from her collapse.  Sebastian and Bethany called to her, even as she disappeared.  Fenris leapt to follow, though and Varric launched three bolts before he called them both to order.  “First things first, kids, c’mon!”

They had enough experience with such creatures that the skirmish was not too difficult, the demon already oozing ichor from a thousand wicked cuts as if Aeryn had become a whirlwind by the time Sebastian and Bethany joined the fray.  A freezing spell held it fast, Sebastian caught it in one of its larger eyes, Varric in another and while it stopped to pluck out the offending shafts, Fenris took a gargantuan slashing blow that nearly cut the thing in twain. 

Sebastian dropped his bow, looking for Aeryn and found her slumped against the cragged, mossy wall, shadow flickering around her as she drew a hand over her face.  And then she was awhirl, again.  Stalking towards….Bethany?

“Tell me it’s not true.”  Aeryn’s voice was low and dangerous and her sister’s warm complexion turned ashen as she was crowded back against a pillar. 

“I…”

“ _Tell me.”_

 _“_ I _can’t.”_ Bethany flinched when Aeryn’s hands came up swiftly but they only clutched at her robes.  Desperation in the way those normally steady hands shook.

“Beth, _please_.”

“He never used it again, Aeryn…I’m…I’m _almost_ positive.”

The voice in her head was shouting.  Maker, it was starting to ache.  “But you don’t know.” 

Why did Aeryn look like her heart was breaking?  Bethany touched her shoulder, gingerly. “He told me that he’d had to.  That I should never…that very little was worth taking that kind of risk.  That he’d been very lucky and that he had to be so careful not to…do it again.  He was afraid of it.  He made me promise.”

Promises.  Their father had made both of them promise things he’d not been able to do himself.    She forced her fingers let go of the soft leather bodice of Bethany’s robes and drew away. 

Only to find Sebastian standing before her, with a determined look in his eyes that she wanted to hide from.  “Let me see your hands.”

 _Void._ She didn’t want to, but found herself holding them out like a child presenting for washing, anyway

She covered the obeisance with snark. “If I say paper-cuts you won’t believe me, will you?”  His gaze was brilliant and grim and her chin dropped.  “The dagger is…it’s using my blood.  To guide the spell or open the seals.  I don’t know.”

“So I saw.” He brushed his fingers over the seared cuts, red and clearly sore as she flinched. 

“My father made that thing.  He did this.” Keeping herself to a harsh whisper, Aeryn just managed to keep the tremble out of her voice, just barely managed not to add, _And what did he do to me?_

“I know.”

His normally warm voice was grim and she scrambled to explain.

 “There isn’t a _choice_.  If we’re getting out of here, I have to…”  But he closed his hands around hers, long fingers gentle and soothing.  He bowed his head as if he was praying again and Aeryn felt some of the jangling nervousness leave and her father’s voice quiet.  Sebastian understood.  For now, it was enough.

“Bethany, come and heal your sister, please.”  Sebastian could see her bewilderment, too plainly, and that alone made him careful.  He would not add to her distress, not here and now. 

Bethany took Aeryn’s hands in his stead and her healing spell, cool and green, enveloped them.

Fenris waited until the spell dissipated and then approached.  “Hawke.  We need you armed, but in normal circumstances I would hesitate to let you continue so, after that.”

Sebastian bit his tongue.  To disarm Aeryn would leave her too vulnerable, but this was a conversation between partners, not friends.

“I…think I’m alright.” 

“If there is some latent trigger…”  Fenris swore.  “I do not like this.”

“And I’m having a blighted picnic with honey cakes, yes, thanks.”

“Brat.” He sighed.  “I cannot disarm you.  On my head, if it is a mistake.”  

 

0000000

 

Another room, another seal.  Another fight and the dragging weariness that came when blood magic stole the sap from her veins.  Aeryn found herself wishing she wasn’t so familiar with it.

Bethany was closest and grabbed her arm when she stumbled.  “Let me do the next one.”

“Oh, maybe there isn’t a next one.  Maybe we’re done and it’s just a cup of tea with a nice elvish lady and a quest to find her lost knitting needle.”

Under her breath, Bethany swore, quite creatively too.

“Ooh, language.  Do you kiss your Templar with that mouth?”

Bethany wrinkled her nose at her sister’s attempt at humor but only answered drily, “Not anymore.  Please, let me do…”

The twisted smile dropped from her sister’s face and for a moment she just looked tired.  “You can’t.”

“Blast it all Aeryn, you don’t have to do…”

“ _No_ , Beth.  I mean you really _can’t_.” Aeryn unclenched her fist.  On the tips of her fingers, Bethany could see the seared red scars, like tiny hot teeth had snapped shut on the sensitive pads of Aeryn’s slim tapered fingers.  “I’m taking no chance that this could…infect you, corrupt you.”

There were grim lines on either side of Bethany’s mouth.  Warily, Aeryn asked, “What?  What do you know?”

And for once, Bethany knew exactly how Aeryn felt, trying to decide just how much truth to tell. “Just…Aeryn…if he did this.  They don’t write spells like this in books for good little Circle mages to find, you know?”

Meaning Father had to deal with a demon to learn these tricks.  “Yeah.  Maker, I wish Merrill was here.”

“I’ll do my best, you know.”

“I do know.  But sometimes practical knowledge comes in handy. C’mon.  We might make another floor and find a decent place to rest. “

0000000

After the last of her father’s traps, this one binding a desire demon, was opened and vanquished, it was Sebastian who cornered Aeryn while Fenris and Varric scouted ahead. 

“ _Leannan_?  Let me carry it, for a while at least.” 

She looked up at him, sullenly.  Closer, he could see her lips were pale and her eyes were dull and dilated and Sebastian thought for a minute that if she didn’t hand the bizarre dagger over he would _take_ the blighted thing from her. 

To his surprise, though, she unbuckled the makeshift scabbard she’d rigged for it on her hip.  “Give me that bit of chamois you keep in your pouch.”  He handed over the soft leather and she wrapped the handle securely.  “Don’t hold it. Just…keep it in your pack, alright?”

She watched him fit it into his satchel and gave him a small smile.  “Thanks.  I don’t think it’ll make much difference, but it’s awkward.  Keeps banging against me, throws off my stride.”   She patted him on the arm and turned to move on.

“I am sorry, _à ruin_.”

Quizzical, she looked back to him. “For what, love?”

He ran a hand through his hair before he answered, “Insisting that we investigate this mess.  We’d not be down here, you’d not be shut in if not for…”

“Are you worrying about that?  It’s alright, you know.  I’m not alone.  And I’m certainly not in the dark.”  She brushed a rough thumb under his blazing eyes and Sebastian turned his head to kiss her hand.

“The Maker’s Light is perhaps somewhat dimmed by my fondness for worldly glory.”  He mocked himself.

Aeryn cupped his cheek. “Bright enough for me.”  She wouldn’t let him blame himself for this. 

“That’s a damned long bridge we have to cross, Hawke.”  Varric returned from his scouting and interrupted them. 

Sighing, she nodded.  “Well, let’s get across it then.”

There were more darkspawn waiting for them on the bridge.  Fenris had arranged them so that Bethany, Varric and Sebastian were doing the bulk of the work.  He and Aeryn were harrying the creatures so that the ranged fighters had better targets. 

But the darkspawn here had a new form of attack and it defied the strategy.   Aeryn, caught off guard as she turned to check on her sister going toe to toe with an emissary, took the brunt of the first charge.

Air left her lungs as it crushed her against a battlement.  For just a moment she teetered over the abyss.  She couldn’t move; arms were trapped by the rusted, bent metal of the genlock’s shield.  Empty space behind her and the brutal, hideous face in front of her and no room to move and _oh Sebastian_ and then she was being yanked forward by magic as Bethany’s spell caught her along with the creature.  Aeryn managed to turn so that her leather covered shoulder took the brunt of the slide across stone, instead of her face.  Varric grabbed her arms as she slid past, his braced stance and burly strength enough to jerk her out of the spell’s influence and leaving the genlock open to Fenris’ blade. 

“Thanks, Varric.  Have I ever told you you’re my favorite?”  She gasped, trying to draw in a full breath.

“Stick with me, Hawke.  I’ll take you nicer places someday if you’re sweet.”

She snickered, trailing off into a wincing cough.  “Oh, sod.  Don’t make me laugh.  Blighted thing cracked a rib.”

In fact, it had cracked three of Aeryn’s ribs and Bethany called a halt to allow her healing spell to set and to insist that they all scrub as best they could with a limited amount of water and the one vial of the Warden’s cleansing potion she had. 

Under a set of sturdy arches, they found a raised platform of stone that seemed to be the best of the defensible sites in the eerily lit, vast chamber.

Instead of resting, though, Aeryn pulled out the pack of dried vegetables and spices she kept on her to start dinner over the fire that Bethany had started.  “Aeryn, stop.  Let one of us…”

“Let me be.  None of you can cook worth a copper and I’m hungry.”  She grinned, but it was as much a grimace as anything and there was a plea in her voice and she ducked her head to hide it. 

“Sebastian.  Help me set up this barricade.”  Fenris’ gruff voice stopped him and he turned to the elf.

“Fenris…”

“Please.”  Green eyes locked on his and Sebastian looked at Aeryn’s stiff back, and sighed before turning to walk to the worn stone steps that marked the only entrance to the platform.  A barricade of the fallen stone would give them a moment to prepare before any attack.

He worked in silence for a minute before glancing back at her, catching her rubbing the sore ends of her fingers.  “She needs to rest and allow her strength to…”

“I am aware of that.  But she will not, she will fidget and grouse and then she will shut us out.  Better to let her stay busy.” 

 _I know that._ He didn’t say.  It was a nasty spurt of jealousy and Sebastian tamped it down ruthlessly.  “I am worried for her, Fenris.  She isn’t telling us what’s truly going on in her head.”

Fenris nodded, “As am I.  But it is her struggle.  It has always been hers.  We can only stand by as she has done for us.”

“A little prodding helps at times.”  

“It has.   But not just now, I think. Sometimes…sometimes anger and walls are all you have to hold you together, Sebastian. And in Hawke’s case, the occasional inappropriate joke.  It is like when you stopped us at the seal…there are times when to interfere does not help.”

Sebastian swallowed and wedged a stone into a gap to shore up a shaky bit.  And if he pushed too hard, he could leave her vulnerable and this was no place for vulnerability, there were enough things doing that to her now.  “Yes, you’re probably right.” 

Fenris heaved another rock into place, “I take no joy in it.” 

Bethany walked up and chuckled.  “You two will take all night with this.  Stand back.”  As soon as they’d moved out of range, she called up a gathering spell and rocks hustled out of the corners, scraping lightly as they moved to pile themselves neatly together.  “There. Now, come and drink your tea before Aeryn twists her head off trying to keep an eye on you and not scorch dinner at the same time.”

After she’d started the stew and lodged the pot up on the spit to let it simmer, Sebastian watched her pace the edge of the camp they’d set up, skirting the encroaching shadows beyond the small fire.  Not a great deal of wood down here, but enough that if they collected it as they went, fires were possible, for the sense of holding away the darkness, at least.  But she was staying out of the circle of light it threw, protecting her night vision. 

On her second sweep, he stood in her path.  “Sebastian…” she started in an annoyed tone.

“I will not tell you to sleep, _à ruin_ , but you are going to sit and have a cup of tea, at least.”

“I’ve got watch.”

“Varric has always taken first watch, so long as I’ve marched with you.”

She dragged her hand across her eyes.  “Stop using my own routines against me.”  She was tired, but her father was urging her on.  She’d given up asking him to leave her be. 

“As soon as you start to use your brain instead of your gut.  You’re no good to yourself or us if you can’t rest, hmm?”

With an ill-natured shrug, she followed him back to the fire.  Varric had already set up on a nice bit of broken building that provided a good overlook, with a sheer stone wall at his back. 

Sebastian handed her the tin mug of tea that Bethany had poured and measured out a good glug of honey to sweeten it.  “Sit.”

He winced at the flash of resentment in stormy grey eyes as she jerked away from his hand on her elbow.  “I’m not your hound.”

Chastened, he bowed slightly, “No, you are not.  I apologize.”  Softly he tried again, “I’m afraid I’m not in the best of moods either, _leannan_.  I just… _please_ come and sit wi’ me?”

Aeryn searched his face for a minute, feeling a knot in her chest at the guilt she saw there.  Sebastian really did have contrite down, quite well. Taking the tin cup he offered, she settled back on her heels just at the edge of the fire where Fenris had pulled out a whetstone.  When Sebastian sat next to her, carefully giving her a certain amount of space, she dropped and scootched closer, until she could feel the warmth of him against her thigh.  She heard him sigh and when he hesitantly set his hand on the back of her neck, she leaned into it until his fingers began to stroke. 

His hand on her silenced her father’s voice.  _Well, there’s something at least._ Settled, Aeryn sipped at the tea and watched Fenris’ hands in the calming, repetitive motion smoothing the edge of his blade.  The scent of the spiced brew wafted up and for a moment it even pushed aside the cloying yet bitter smell of decay that hung in the air of the prison.

Sebastian was right.  She did need the rest.  Her ribs ached and it had been a few years now since constant fighting on no sleep at all had been a regular part of her routine. 

And recently…she’d almost come to take for granted that she would fall asleep and wake up in her own bed, like a normal person instead of broken rest and waking up in the armchair in front of her fire with the taste of liquor in her mouth or leaning against the tree in the garden, muscles sore from whatever abuse she’d put them through.  Those were good things, she reminded herself.  And it was largely due to Sebastian’s faithful, gentle presence and his refusal to allow her to give in to the nightmares.  Finishing the last too sweet swallow, more dreg and honey than tea, Aeryn sat aside the mug and curled into Sebastian’s side. 

Startled, he looked at the top of her head, hair tangled and matted with sweat.  She’d arranged herself against him and when he wrapped his arm around her shoulders, she snuggled her head into the curve there to avoid the rolled edges of his armor “Don’t let me sleep too long, my watch next,” she whispered before closing her eyes. 

Troubled, Sebastian trailed his fingers along her arm.  This soft trust worried him, as did the small passive things Aeryn had done since she’d told them about what the blade was doing to her.  He wanted to believe it was just the difference in how close they’d become.  That snap of defiance a moment before was reassuring, so perhaps it was only his imagination.  But there was that lingering memory of how she’d once simply followed orders, handed over control in a moment of stress.  Trust or something else, something dangerous?  He would have to be careful. 

Bethany sat down on her other side and fell asleep almost instantly, weary to the bone with the constant spell work.  She slumped against Aeryn and Sebastian shifted his arm to accommodate the mage, as well.  Fenris looked up as he replaced the whetstone in his belt pouch and the elf’s face went rather soft looking at the two women.  But he only laid his head back against the broken wall at their back and closed his eyes. 

Sebastian bowed his head, intending to pray before he slept, but the long march and the series of fights had worn him down as well and he managed only, _“Holy Andraste, please guide our steps clear though all before us is shadow…”_

000000

In her sleep, the voice came clearer.

_“What have you done, pup?”_

_“I had to, Papa.  He’d have hurt Beth.”_

_“I know…but, child…” fingers in her hair, horror on his face.  “Never mind.   There is work to do.  Did you…”  The Fade shifted around her and the Brecillian Forest dissolved into the ancient arches of Ostagar and the battle that never ended._

_She was lost._

_The mud was thick under her hands, sticky and fouled with blood and she could smell the rot starting always the rot.  Her fingers were black with it, caked under her nails, ash on her skin where the corpses burned in heaps and where_

_Where were they?  What have you done?_  Sister, why did you leave?

_Lost.  Carver was lost.  They were all gone. Only her left now._

_It was too late.  She was always too late.  She’d failed them failed her sister and_ **him** what have you done _and now there was a hand creeping into her hair and pulling and something dull and cold at her throat.  No.  No no no_

Fenris heard the slide of steel too close and he snapped awake.  He saw nothing in front of him but the fire and then Varric’s footsteps as the dwarf came to investigate as well. 

It was movement out of the corner of his eye that had him in motion, fast, _faster reaching_ to grab Bethany and haul her away as Hawke snapped around in a feral crouch, with blank eyes and one of her small knives drawn and gleaming, only a small hesitance away from her sister’s throat.

“Hawke!” He set himself between the sisters.

Sebastian was shaking and rubbing his arm, it had clearly numbed with the two women sleeping against him.  “Aeryn, stop!  You’re safe, _rùn biodagain_ , be still.”  He kept his distance from her knife, ready to roll away but he continued to speak to her; a foreign tongue in a low, calming tone and Fenris suspected that this sort of a wake up was not an unusual occurrence between them.

She halted, the shadows sliding away, and then shook herself, dog-like before rubbing her eyes with a free hand.  “Sebastian?  What…”

“You were…dreaming.”  Bethany said shakily from behind Fenris, still groggy from being woken so violently but dispelling the force she’d called up incase Aeryn hadn’t woken in time.

Aeryn rubbed the back of her head.  “Something…yanked my hair.”  There was a red scraped mark across her throat and Sebastian approached her carefully to look, probing the clearly tender skin.  She didn’t move under his attentions but she didn’t relax either.

“I think you slid down against my armor.”

“I may have…” Bethany wiggled her fingers. 

“I’m sorry.”  Aeryn’s voice went small and she’d hunched in on herself, an arm around her gut. 

Sebastian set his hand against her cheek.  “It’s no’ your fault.”

“Who else to blame, though?  Are you alright?” Aeryn pulled away from him and asked Bethany in that small voice.   Maker, he hated that little, quiet voice, the way it signified Aeryn turning her cruel assessment on herself. 

She’d shrugged out of her scabbards before they slept, but now she pulled the small throwing knives from their hidden sheaths, all seven.  And she unbuckled the narrow blade from her leg as well, handing it to Fenris.  Completely disarmed while dressed, Sebastian thought, possibly for the first time since he’d met her.  His throat knotted.  But he did not stop her. 

Bethany tried to reassure her, “I’m fine.  Fenris…”  He met her eyes and they both looked away, as if startled by the fact that they’d done it.

“I woke before there was any trouble.  You should take this back before we continue.”

“Thanks.”  He nodded and his hand drifted over her shoulder as he returned to his corner of the swept stone to try and sleep again.

 “Aeryn…” 

“You’d better take next watch, Sebastian.  I don’t think…I’m not up to it.”  She’d pulled a knife on her sister.  On her baby sister, who was the sole reason she...

 _Maker, if Fenris hadn’t pulled Bethany away…_ Aeryn spun to the fire, grabbing the poker to stir it up shoving down the dismal path of her thought with busywork.  “Varric, you want a cup before you sleep?”  She asked the dwarf as he settled Bianca next to him and sat with a tired huff on the block of stone nearest the makeshift firepit.

“No, sweetheart, I’m good.  You alright?”  The skin around his golden brown eyes was creased with concern and she waved him off. 

“Sure.  Never better.”  Yeah, that’s reassuring.  She popped her stiff neck and poured a cup for Sebastian instead, setting it in his hands as he’d done for her earlier.   He was hovering at her elbow, no wonder.  “Keep your back to the stone, yeah?” 

“I will be careful, _mo chridhe_.  Will you rest?”  Cautious, he asked instead of insisting.

 “No.” Aeryn gave him a half-hearted shrug and a corner of a smile to soften the blunt word but she kept her face averted, toying with the rolled edge of the empty sheath on her glove.

Well, at least she wasn’t lying to him. He could be grateful for small things. Sebastian leaned over to kiss her forehead before he took his bow up and walked up to Varric’s vantage spot to take his turn on watch. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


	25. Chapter 25

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Continuing the Legacy storyline, so some characters and dialogue carry over. Sorry for the delay on this chapter, folks. Thanks to jillyfae for her beta skills!_

Aeryn pulled the stew off the fire and ignored her sister’s eyes on her back.  She could imagine easily enough the look Bethany was giving her, that derivative of their father’s sharp interest and their mother’s determined curiosity, laced with a concern that only a little sister could give, exasperated and annoyed.  But of all of them, Bethany had always been slowest to speak her mind, not because she was reticent, but because she was thoughtful and careful not to wound.

Fine.  Aeryn wasn’t in the mood to talk anyway.

So she startled a little when Bethany asked, “When did they come back?”   

Aeryn glanced over her shoulder and lifted an eyebrow, curiously.  

“The nightmares?”

“Oh.”  She shifted through Varric’s pack next to her feet and pulled out a set of tin bowls.  “Ostagar…and the Deep Roads.”

Once upon a time, Bethany had known all of Aeryn’s moods.  This one had her puzzled, though if she had a ghost voice in her head she’d probably be a little inscrutable as well. “You had them before, though.  I remember.  You’d have awful screaming nightmares and Father would come in and…talk to you and it would end.”

“Yeah.”  Aeryn ladled stew into one of the bowls and handed it to her sister, eyes casing the limited view of the cavern they’d found themselves in past the last seal.  She reminded Bethany of some of the mages the Templars had brought in.  Hunted.  They’d looked hunted.  They’d never let themselves be still, never let the Templars out of their sights.  Rarely slept.  

Why hadn’t she ever made that connection with Aeryn, before?

Because in the months since the Chantry had fallen and Bethany had been with her, Aeryn hadn’t been so…obvious about it.  She’d been better.  

Bethany took a few bites before she realized her sister hadn’t filled a bowl for herself and was simply drawing shapes in the ashes on the edge of the firepit with the steel-cased toe of her boot, gazing out into the dark.  “You said you were hungry, too.”

Shrug.  “Not a good idea.”

“Aeryn, you have to…”

“Way I feel right now, I’d be cleaning it up later.”  

Bethany took another sip of the stew, savoring the fruity taste of the little dried peppers that had plumped up in the broth.  Fenris’ influence on her sister’s cooking, she thought.  Fereldan stews rarely had any spice.  “He woke you up, talking to you.  Sebastian, I mean.”

“Yeah.”  Aeryn banked the coals under the stewpot , Bethany’s  gaze  making her shoulders itch.   Eyes on her back, watchers in the dark and whispers in her head.   She shivered and  snapped,“ What do you want me to say, Beth?  I can’t say I’m sorry again, you’ll just tell me it’s not my fault.”

“Your man said that, not I.”  Bethany’s grave statement  yanked Aeryn’s eyes back to her face, searching.  “ After all, you’re the one who picked up an enchanted object.  You’re the one who sleeps with her knives.”

“Yes I do.  Of course, you always sleep armed as well.”

“Not by any choice in the matter.”

Curiosity flitted across Aeryn’s features.  Bethany bit back a smile but it was  wiped out by her sister’s next query.  “Would you give it up?  If you could close your eyes, click your heels and say, ‘I don’t want to be a mage any longer,’ just give it up with no other consequence, would you?”

“I could ask you the same question, you know.” she tried to buy herself a moment to think.

“Yes, well I’m older and I asked first.”

Bethany sniffed. “That’s mature.”

“That’s me, the mature one.”  

Bethany shook her head and then...hesitatingly, shook it again.  “No.  No I wouldn’t.  I can do some good.  I can help you.  I can protect.  I can, if need be, heal.  It’s worth…all the rest of it.”  She took a final bite of the stew, scraping the sides clean of the congealing broth.  “Well, how about you?”

Aeryn listened to the murmurs of her father.  He’d done his best.  Whatever this was, he’d done his best.  Until the day he couldn’t and then he made her promise to do hers.  Had she?   Bethany’s chin was set.  She was an adult.  She ought to know.  

Taking a moment, a breath, Aeryn plunged into the real question,  “Well, you tell me.  Did you like the Circle so well, you wish you’d gone when you were eight?”

Aeryn might have been speaking quietly, but Bethany heard the sharp undertone. “What?”

“You like to play ‘do you remember’.  So do you remember when we lived in the woods on the edge of the Brecillian Forest?”

“The little cabin…by a creek?”  Bethany could see it, in her mind’s eye.  The tiny house, the walls made of logs with some of the bark still clinging. The way the light had filtered through the leaves while she played tag with Carver.  It had been cool there, under the trees with the creek flowing nearby.

“That’s right.  And then one day we went fishing and the next we loaded everything into the wagon and left?”  Her sister’s gaze was fixed on hers and Bethany wondered if Aeryn realized how nerve wracking that was, glass grey and chilling to the bone.

“Yes…”  Who was she kidding?  Hawke knew exactly how disconcerting her stare could be.  She used it to her advantage time and again.  

“Would you have rather have gone to the Circle, then?  Or was it worth me killing a Templar to keep you with us?”  Before Bethany could even process that, Aeryn spoke again.  “How about Lothering?  You liked Lothering, liked being close to the Chantry, liked being a farmgirl?  I did, too.  Now…it was a little hard on Sister Rilla.”

“Sister Rilla?  She ran into a…something in the forest.  A wolf or…”  

Aeryn’s halfsmile showed just the slightest hint of tooth.  “Rilla met _me_ in the forest. After she saw you practicing a fire spell on the back field. And Evan Marddyn?  You danced with him at the summer festival and he pinched your arse on the way home?”

“Evan joined the…the…” But Bethany petered out at the expression of pale pity on Aeryn’s face.

“The mercenary band that came through during the festival?  No, Evan was on his way to the Chantry to tell Ser Bryant about how you froze his fingers for him.  Did you know? I gave Evan his first kiss when he was fifteen.  He cried.  When I cut his throat, not when I kissed him.”  

A memory of a stubbly upper lip and sweat that smelled of boy and  sweet hay took her for a moment, until Bethany jarred her out of the reverie.  

“His mother got letters!”

“Yeah?  You’re right.  Because I stopped sleeping real well after I used a bottle of vitriol to get rid of his face and that mole on his shoulder and the hand; that scar he had from his first sword, and then threw what was left into the lake.  When his mother started worrying about not getting letters…I figured it was best if I left and joined Cailan’s Army.  And I sent letters all the way along to Gwaren.  Including the one that said he’d died in service.”

Refusing a sudden urge to cover her ears like a child, Bethany finally squeaked out, “Why are you telling me this?”  Why now ?  Was it just  Father pushing or something worse?  

“You asked.”  Aeryn’s jaw lost the hard set and her eyes softened.  “And so you’ll understand what I’m saying when I tell you…I wouldn’t change it.  Not one thing, Beth.  Anything to keep you with us.  Anything to keep you safe.  And…Mother, when she made us go to Kirkwall…I knew…I _knew_ I couldn’t keep you from the Templars unless…I wouldn’t change that either.  Do you understand?”

It was Bethany’s turn to try and find something in the fire to make sense of what she was hearing.  “When…when I went to the Circle, did Mother blame you?”

“ _Where were you_?”  Aeryn nodded, eyes scanning the dark again.  “That’s what she asked me when Carver died and when you went to the Circle.   _Where were you?_ She didn’t say another word to me for two weeks…not until Sebastian came and promised to help find out what had happened to you, if you would stay in Kirkwall or get shipped out to another Circle.  If you’d even lived through your Harrowing.  I don’t think she remembered…she was sick and…anyway.  It was my fault. I turned away from you for a second and…But…no.  If the world has to be like it is, I’d rather be one of the dangerous folk than the one who needs protecting.”   Aeryn paused for a moment, but  when she looked back at Bethany her eyes were clear and her chin had lifted.  “I need to be as I am, what I am, if I’m to be any use to Sebastian.”

Oh?  It took a few moments for Bethany to think past the weight of what Aeryn had told her to frame her question and she didn’t manage to do it well.  “I didn’t think…I’m sorry…I had thought you were…that it was love that brought you two…”

Aeryn was listening again to some strand of Father’s thought she could almost catch and very nearly didn’t hear her sister’s halting query.  “What?  Oh, no.  No, it was.  But…if I was only a farmgirl, one we’d be dead a long time ago and two…I suppose I’d be sitting at home in Ferelden rather than with him.  He needs my knives and shadows more than he needs my knitting and kisses.”

Knives.  Something clicked for Bethany then.  Aeryn had had a screaming nightmare the night they’d moved away from the forest and Bethany remembered wondering if her big sister was a mage, too, when Malcolm had knelt beside her sister, who had crammed up against the wagon wheel pushing away from something Bethany couldn’t see, cupped her face in his hands and spoke softly to her until she stopped screaming.  Remembered her father bartering with a merchant alongside the road on their way to Redcliffe.  She and Carver had been…not quite eight.  Aeryn had been eleven when father was fitting her small hand around a slim elvhen dagger hilt and asking her how it felt.  

“Heavy,” Aeryn had said, frowning.  She’d had those little throwing knives as long as Bethany could remember and her fillet knife that she’d kept in a leg sheath much like the one she’d just taken off.  But the daggers came then, the merchant who’d just come from the Forest trading in elvhen things she’d found.  

“You’ll get stronger, pup,” their father had answered.  

“We left that cabin and…Aeryn…You were _eleven.”_

That’s what Sebastian had said, hung on as well.  How was it they came to be so sheltered, her sister and her lover?  “I was strong.  And fast and the shadows…well, I always had that trick right?  And he was sick.  Addled.”

“But why did Father…how could he…encourage you?”

“He needed me.  Mother.  You don’t remember, but Mother lost a baby about a year before that.  It took a long time for her to get better and...he needed me, Beth.  Father didn’t want me to kill but he needed me to do it.  He protected you the way he could as long as he could.  And when he couldn’t…then it was my job.”  She took a sip of the tea she’d poured up, wrinkling her nose at the bitterness of the  brew without honey.  “I’m sorry I didn’t do it better.  I’m sorry you thought you had to save me and Mother by going to the circle.”

“Anyone could see that you were in trouble, Aeryn.  I…didn’t think I had the right to ask it of you any longer.”

“I was doing better, Beth…I was.  Between Fenris and Varric and…you were right.  I wasn’t alone. You shouldn’t have been, either.”  Something like approval thrummed through her father’s thought tone and Aeryn shivered and glanced up to the nearly hidden ledge where Sebastian was keeping watch.  She wished she could join him and he could…do whatever it was that chased the voice away.  But he was working and didn’t need her as a distraction.  A thread of resentment spun up before she could knock it back…she’d gotten so blighted clingy in the last few months.  

Bethany watched emotion chase itself across her sister’s face before Aeryn grimaced and shook herself, draining the last of the tea.  When she set the cup aside, Aeryn’s face was bland and cool.

“And anyway…it’s what I am.  What I’m meant for.  I…don’t really know what to do with myself if there’s not someone to…fight for.  Did you want to ask anything else?”

Bethany shook her head.  “Not…now.  Maybe…let me think about what you said, alright?”  She was proud of herself for not letting her voice shake.   _Holy Andraste, Father.  How could you?_

“Of course.”  Fenris had been watching them the last few minutes, Aeryn had heard him wake not long after she asked Bethany her question.  “Here, Fenris.  Don’t let it get cold.”  

He took the bowl from her out-stretched hand and nodded when Aeryn whispered in her basic Tevene, “If she asks, tell her.”  

Fenris raised his eyebrow at that and her resigned expression.  It was the first time she’d ever expressly given him permission to discuss the things she’d told him of,  the things he’d seen himself.  Secret things she’d done working for the Red Iron.  Private jobs she’d taken to gain a little influence.  Tricks she’d learned until she’d gone from a  mage’s private body guard to an army scout  to an assassin in truth. He didn’t move when Bethany sat beside him, legs curled up in her long robes and chin tucked in, contemplative.  It reminded Fenris of old days when Hawke would join him for an evening, both of them mostly silent over their cups.  He wished he could offer her a glass of something.  Bethany looked as if she could use it.

As Aeryn walked to the edge of the stone platform that they were camped on, Aeryn could feel Sebastian’s eyes on her and stretching her spine with a wince as her ribs reminded her, she raised her hand in a wave.  

He returned the gesture and shifted his gaze.  The line of her back and scraps of the whispered conversation told him all he needed to know.  She and Bethany were talking.

He flexed a stiff muscle in his back. unknowingly mirroring her own wince.  If that was the reason for them being down here, in this nightmare of a place, then perhaps…perhaps it was worth the pain it would cause her in the meantime.  She’d not had one of the terrible dreams since she’d finally told him what she dreamed.  If she told Bethany…perhaps, a little more of the poison would leach away.   Little by little.  

 

00000

Sebastian came down and ate while Fenris took his turn in watch over them, although Fenris opted to keep moving rather than use the perch Varric and Sebastian had.

He watched her, as she sorted through her poisons, holding one violent colored vial up and then another.  Discarding one to roll another between her palms in the light.  A different sort of tic than the one that had her playing with her knives.  Now and again, he saw her gaze flick to the small pile of her weapons by Fenris’ bedroll.  And then the potions were shoved back into their pouch in a chime and clank of glass, in what seemed like a random order.  Every vial had its place though, to be pulled with only the brush of her sensitive fingers to feel the little bumps and scratches she etched into the glass to tell her which was which.

She’d been silent since he returned, though she’d given him a corner of her crooked smile and leaned into the hand he’d cupped her cheek with before handing him his dinner.  Bethany was sleeping again, curled up between the stone and Varric’s warm bulk.  He’d patted her shoulder as she left them, thanking her for keeping Aeryn company and for allowing Aeryn’s…was it a confession?  No, just an admission.  Aeryn didn’t confess her past, she laid it out for one to accept or not.   

The silence wasn’t oppressive, even in this dank cavern, just pensive.  He’d taken small vows of silence often enough…usually when he felt a certain sneaking pride in his voice burbling up; he knew they had value.  Aeryn’s silences were rarer but usually just as healing for her.  Her jokes and verbal sparring were as much defense as they were a part of her personality.  If she didn’t feel the need to fling them up at him, then perhaps she was at rest in some way.

The scrape of his spoon broke their quiet.  “You spoke with Bethany.”

She nodded.  

“It is right, I think.”  An arched brow prompted him to add, “ _In the absence of light, shadows thrive_.”

That wrinkle popped up between her eyebrows.  But she nodded again.

Sebastian sighed and finished his bowl, sprawling his legs out in front of him in that way that told Aeryn that he was exhausted.  He likely wouldn’t rest until she did, though, so what to do?  She sipped at her tea and rubbed her temple, considering.  When he finished his bowl she scooted next to him and laid her head on his lap, letting the warmth of his legs soothe her.  

“Is your head aching?”  

“A little.”  Her whisper was barely audible.

“Should I wake your sister?”

“No, just could you…”  He set his hand to rubbing, the little ridge of bone behind her ear and then down the tense line of her neck.  After a few minutes he felt the rigid spine relax gradually.

“Thanks.”

Leaning over, he pressed a kiss to her forehead.  “Dinna thank me for such things, _mo chride_. You should have a rest, if you can.” Aeryn shook her head and Sebastian leaned his head back against the rock, finding a divot that cupped his skull almost comfortably.  “You don’t normally have two of your dreams in one night, maybe…”

“I can’t even close my eyes.  He’s just…there and then I close my eyes and they’re…I can’t.”  She could feel her throat tightening and her pitch rising and swallowed, even as Sebastian’s hands began to move again, along her back and her forehead.  He was solid and real under her cheek and she forced herself to focus on that and not the murmur at the back of her skull and the grotesque creatures that were lurking just past the limit of her vision, waiting to drag her family away from her again.   _Go away.  Father, please go away and bloody well take them with you._  

Her fingers had clutched in the leg of his trousers, drawing the leather uncomfortably tight.  She was impossibly still, again, tension in her body not even allowing a tremble to escape.  No wonder her poor head ached.  He longed to curl her up and make her forget for a few minutes even, but here was not the place.  “Tell me what I can do.” He asked and hated the helpless feeling her fear brought out in him.  

“Three years ago, I’d have given my treasury and my second best daggers for this alone.”

He went along with the small joke instead of the melancholy.  “Only your second best?”

“Well, if I’ve given up my treasury, too, then I’d have to earn us a living.”  She paused and he felt her jaw clench against his thigh.  Girding herself up to ask him, “Sing me something?”

Startled, he took a moment and then let his finger traced along her ear.  “D’ya have a request, then?”

“Whatever comes to mind; the Chant, your shopping list, Isabela’s version of Wicked Grace’s Daughter.”

“Turn over, _anam chara_.”  

“Why?”

“Let your friend guard you, stop looking out into the dark.” She shifted, grunting a little as her ribs twinged, until she was looking up at him instead, the skin around his eyes thin with weariness and bruised but the irises still the loveliest shade of blue she’d ever seen.  She’d stolen piles of sapphires than never hoped to match them.  

Unbraiding the hair at her temples, Sebastian smoothed the rough waves back and began rubbing her temples again, never taking his eyes from hers, blinking slowly, breathing slowly until her own breaths matched his instead of the hitched half breaths she’d been taking.  

He began to hum, reflexively reaching for the soothing drone of Transfigurations.  Aeryn didn’t meditate as he did, preparing for a long session of prayer or chant.  He’d come to see how her training replaced that for her, the repetitive motion and the way the blades sat in her hands as much of a focus for her as prayers were for him.  But she needed rest not motion.  

The intimacy of this; watching her eyes shift while he sang, softly as he could manage so as not to disturb anyone or draw undue attention, the pupils dilating a little wider…she was right.  Three years ago, he couldn’t have imagined this, how it would feel like grace.  

And then, just beyond their little safe space, stone slid against stone and Aeryn twisted, pushed off and landed next to her pile of gear as Fenris shouted to wake them.  

Sebastian reached for his bow. Elthina had once told him, back when he was first learning to pray, to open himself to the wider call of the Maker and failing, failing with every attempt.  “Grace, my child, is ever fleeting. Even the smallest moments are precious.”

Varric grumbled as he lined Bianca up on the nearest hurlock.  “Next time, let’s not antagonize the darkspawn by singing hymns, maybe?”

“Sorry, Varric.”

Aeryn clung to the shadows and snuck up on the genlock that was barreling towards Bethany.  Behind them, that was the key.  They were fast, but not quite fast enough to flip that massive shield before Bethany’s protective sigil caught the genlock.   It howled as Aeryn sliced into its hide, into its stinking armpit and into the heart.  She could almost see the poison rushing through corroded veins.  

 _Beautiful, really._  Acid green through bile and black gore.  She’d learned to brew that poison on a chilly day in Father’s still room in the barn rain thrumming on the roof kneeling on the bench besides his worktable, chin on hands to watch the solution drip while Father listened to her recite the names of demons and their weaknesses once they came through the veil.  The oxen and the milk cow had thrown enough heat off to make the barn cozy, though. To get that perfect, vicious, potent shade of green you had to boil the woundingwort in a solution with just a tiny pinch of hartshorn and hold it to the boil for exactly three turns of the apothecary’s hourglass and then immediately…Fenris shouted and she shook herself out of her transfixion just in time to roll under a poorly launched fire ball.  “Beth, watch it!”

“Wasn’t me!”

“Then who?” Snapping around, Aeryn saw the mage; in Warden blue and silver, spinning her staff like a pike and standing to order as the last darkspawn fell to one of Sebastian’s carefully hoarded arrows.  The crimson tipped fletching sticking out of its throat was oddly jaunty.

The red-haired woman had three companions wearing Warden armor as well and Aeryn was somewhat reminded of their meeting with Meriden months before.  Something here sent the hairs prickling across the back of her neck, though, and she had to force herself to relax.  Sebastian’s elegant presence settling at her back and Fenris stalking up beside her, glowering at the new mage, helped quite a bit.


	26. Chapter 26

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _**Author's Notes and Warning** Continuing the Legacy storyline, includes some dialogue and descriptions from the DLC. Also, while I don't think it's outside of bounds for people accustomed to gameplay, there is a significant amount of described violence and the resulting injuries towards the end of this chapter. Thanks to jillyfae for her beta!_

 “I am Janeka, commander of this station and y _ou_ are the Champion of Kirkwall.  Somehow I expected something different of Malcolm Hawke’s fledgling.  There are rumors that you were a mage.”  The older woman, tall and rangy, radiated power.  She stood over them on a weathered  outcropping of stone foundation observing Aeryn and her companions through shrewd, narrow green eyes.

The fact that they were all trapped in this dank, evil prison seemed to be bothering her not at all.  Aeryn couldn’t help but be resentful and a bit snide in her reply, “Not accurate rumors, apparently.”

The mage nodded coolly, Aeryn’s mockery sliding off.  “Clearly.  It matters not. What _matters_ is that the seals are weak and you hold the Key.  We have an opportunity here, Champion.  And you have a chance to earn your title anew.”

“How’s that now?”  Aeryn was curious, despite herself.  

Something gleamed in the mage’s intent gaze.  Magic?  Hope?  “If we harness Corypheus’ power, we can end the Blights.”

“Do not listen to her!”  Larius came shuffling up and Aeryn eyed him suspiciously.  He was certainly _quiet_ enough to be a bloody darkspawn, popping up in their midst at will. “Please, Hawke.”

Aeryn flicked her gaze over at the pleading ghoul and shrugged.  “I don’t know…ending the Blights has a ring to it.”

“It’d be a damned good story,” Varric agreed and she smirked at him.

“She is listening to _him_.”   The closer they came to the final seal, the more coherent Larius had seemed to grow and now his contempt for Janeka was definite. “She has been here too long and Corypheus’ influence has always been felt by mages first.”  Aeryn heard the sneer he gave to the word mages.

Janeka addressed him, condescension dripping from her tongue.  “You are half darkspawn yourself, now, Larius.  Why should Hawke take your word?   _We_ have studied.  We have dug.  I have spent years...”

The companions listened to them bicker back and forth a few minutes and finally Aeryn cocked her head towards her partner.  Time was wasting.

“What’s the plan, Fenris?”

Fenris’ brow was furrowed.  “What do you mean?”

“Make the decision.  I don’t…I can’t trust that I’m not being pushed one way or the other.”

He eyed the Wardens, Larius standing by himself and the mage flanked by her lieutenants.  “Who would you choose then?”

She rolled her eyes at him.  “I don’t know.” That wasn’t true. But she’d come to the conclusion so suddenly that she didn’t trust it.

Sebastian glanced between them.  “Is this really an argument? Larius is tainted and damaged.  He’s very nearly a ghoul.  And Janeka seems to be acting on some authority, perhaps this idea of hers has some merit.”  Although… _ending_ the Blights? The Maker had allowed the darkspawn for a reason.  It was a punishment.  Did they have the right?  He subsided from his encouragement. 

Fenris’ green eyes were troubled as he looked at them both.  “I would feel better if I at least knew what you were being pushed towards, Hawke.”

_Fine._ “I’d go with Larius, if I was in charge.  Which I’m not.”

Varric shifted on his feet.  “I don’t know, Hawke.  I’m inclined to let the Wardens deal with this their own way.”  Aeryn shrugged.

Fenris bowed his head with a frown.  He, too, would tend to trust Larius over the Warden mage.  But Sebastian was right…Larius was tainted and Varric had a point that the Wardens were known to have their own methods.  There was look of curiosity on Bethany’s face as she observed Janeka.  Clearly she was interested in seeing what Janeka had to say.  If Hawke said Larius, but that she didn’t trust her own opinion…”We will follow Janeka, then.”

“Good.”  Ugh…the smug tone of the mage’s voice rippled over his skin and Hawke shifted suddenly, her daggers gleaming in the halflight and a dangerous glint in her eye.  

Larius pleaded, “Please…do NOT allow Corypheus to leave this place.  Your father…”

“My father is not here.”  Aeryn said flatly.

Bethany’s small “hmph” of dissent came as a surprise to Fenris and he shook his head.  He’d made his decision.  Just because Janeka was distasteful did not make her wrong.

“Lead on then.”  Fenris nodded to the Warden.  

“This way.  Go back to your darkness, Larius.  You’ve lost your bid.”  

Glowering at them all, he spoke. “This is not over.  If I cannot convince you, then I must follow my duty another way.”  He disappeared back into the gloom with a shuffling step, allowing his threat to linger.  

Janeka watched him with distaste and then turned back.  “I doubt he can challenge us, but we should continue as soon as we can.”

“Give us a moment.”

They broke camp quietly.  He turned the narrow blade over in his hands and then Fenris handed Aeryn back the knife she’d turned over.  “This does me no good if it isn’t in your hands.”

She nodded and was appalled at how grateful she was for the measure of his trust in her.  Fenris always had her back.  

They followed Janeka and the other Wardens silently through the damp, dripping caverns for a while before Bethany spoke to Aeryn.  “You know what Father would say.”

“I do.  In fact, I’m pretty sure he’s telling me now.”  He’d been whispering urgently in her ear until she was half tempted to stuff them with lint, useless as that might be to silence a voice in her head.

“He taught us better.”

“I know.”

“Then why…”  

Sodding little sister persistence.  

Stopping so suddenly that Varric nearly tripped over her heels, Aeryn flung a hand out indicating the prison.  “Because I’m standing here in the midst of proof that Father didn’t always take his own sodding advice!” Aeryn snarled at her sister and Sebastian slid his hand to the small of her back.  

“Stop, _mo chridhe_.”  She blinked up at him sullenly before nodding as she strode off.

Varric patted Bethany’s hip and shook his head.  “Maybe now’s not the time, Sunshine.”

“It’s never the time, Varric.  Ten years since Father died and it’s never the time.”  But she subsided as well.

Janeka sniffed, clearly annoyed at the fracas.  Fingers twitching over the knife she had tucked into her waistband, Aeryn barely resisted the urge to flip one past the mage’s arrogant nose.

They passed an altar to Dumat, according to Fenris.  There were dusty plates awaiting a sacrifice that never came and Sebastian shuddered inwardly at the channels that would allow blood to flow and pool in the stone.  Aeryn pulled him away with her cool hand in his.

Varric found some records that he tucked away into his pouch, indicating that an ancestor of his had been lured here with a promise of treasure and found himself trapped for greed.  “Doesn’t hurt to send stuff like this back to Orzammar.  Keeps the lines of communication open.”  

There were more darkspawn. Always more darkspawn, as if they sprang from the stone itself.

Bethany wheedled a few vials of a stout healing potion from the younger member of Janeka’s troop, Alec, who was clearly susceptible to soft brown eyes and a shy smile, but they seemed not to have heard of the potion used at the Vigil.  “We don’t really have a need for such a thing.  I’m surprised they’ve bothered at all.  Better to make recruits of the unfortunate.”  He eyed them speculatively and Fenris surprised Aeryn when he beat her to wedging himself between Bethany and her Warden admirer.

Bethany wasn’t a child though.  “I’d rather die than be forced to your duty, Warden.”  She dismissed him and he backed off with a nod.

It was a wearying march, but Janeka didn’t allow the briefest of rests.  Even her Wardens flagged at the end; Durstan, the older swordsman, called for a pause as they reached a flight of stairs only to have Janeka snap, “We are moving on!” as she yanked Alec to his feet when he knelt to adjust a strap that was rubbing poorly. 

The Wardens exchanged glances but moved forward, waiting for the rest of them to mount the carved stairs.  

They were almost to the final seal when Larius turned up again.

“Hawke, you must listen to me.  I swear releasing Corypheus will not end the Blights.  He cares nothing for aiding the Wardens.  All he wants is to be free.  We _must_ reseal the prison. “

“Tell her the rest of it, Larius.  After all, you’re the reason her father became involved here to begin with.”  Janeka’s voice had a wheedling, insidious quality that felt like beetles scurrying under Aeryn’s skin.  Apparently her father felt the same way, the voice in her head becoming urgent.

She resisted the urge to shake her head.  “What in the Void are you talking about, now?”

“Didn’t he tell you? He’s the one who threatened your _mother._ Your very young, pregnant, mother, I might add and told your father that if he didn’t help the Wardens reseal this prison that they, I suppose _you_ , would be killed.  Although really I doubt he’d have wasted a potential recruit.  Tell us, Larius.  Did you intend to have Leandra Hawke Joined if Malcolm failed?”

There was a noise behind them and Aeryn spun on her heels.  Another pack of Carta dwarves came around the corner of rubble and all of them braced for a fight.  “Mistress, we have cleared the way.  We can reach the final chamber!”

Janeka’s eyes went narrow but to her credit, she didn’t try to deny them.  “Good.  You have done well.  Now go and defend it until we reach it.”

Aeryn felt ice running down her spine.   _This_ is what Father had been warning her of.  “You’re working with the Carta?”

“It was necessary.  They wanted something to believe in, to work for.  I provided it and they gave me what I needed to find Corypheus.”

The audacity of it.  The blatant _heresy_. Threatening a man’s pregnant wife to coerce him into the foulest of magics.  Sebastian had learned several truths about the Wardens that had made him think better of his own boyhood fancies of joining their Order, but this?  And now they wanted to release the creature at the heart of this prison?

And now, despite everything Malcolm Hawke had tried to do to prevent it, Aeryn and Bethany were still caught in the trap.  Thanks to the woman before them.

What would he be willing to do to get them out?  Aeryn was white as chalk but steady.  Her eyes cold and clear and sharply focused, the fear she’d shown him earlier, the lapses of concentration shunted ruthlessly aside and buried by bloody intent. She had been fraying at the edges visibly, but as the Warden grew more agitated, as she showed her hand, Aeryn snapped back into clarity.  Scenting blood, she deepened her focus.  Would it always be that way?   Would the predator always shine like that?He wondered.  He’d seen that deceptive look on her face before; that tiny hint of a feral smile tipping the edges of her mouth, despite herself. 

As far as she was concerned, Janeka was a dead woman.

 He could see her fingers twitch towards the little pouch of poisons.  Magebane, right on top.    _Maker, forgive me._  The righteous man he once thought he’d been would have warned Janeka but Sebastian clenched his bow in his hand and kept his silence.   

“ _You_ hired the Carta to bring my sister here?”

“It was necessary.  We are wasting time!  Come!”  Janeka was losing her steady calm and she jerked towards the stairway that led to the final seal.

“You could have bloody well asked.”

The mage took a steadying breath and they all could see the effort it took to keep her voice consoling.  “We did request her presence once from the Gallows.  The Knight Commander was less than cooperative.  Once you freed your sister, well, given our past relations with the Hawke family we assumed any such request would be denied.  I believed your father had told you…”

“He didn’t.  We didn’t know _anything_ about this.  And I’d have never gone near a sodding Warden if he had.”  Anders had warned her long ago. _The Wardens are not heroes.  Some of them are unbelievably self-sacrificing, gifted, giving…but as a whole…I’m glad I’m away from them.  You should stay away as well._ She wondered how he was, if he was…Janeka was talking again and Aeryn yanked her attention back to the tainted mage in front of her.  

“Larius should never have allowed him to leave.  Your father knew too much of the Wardens for someone outside the fold.”

Bethany answered when Aeryn didn’t. “The whole point of you hiring him was that he wasn’t tainted.”

“And once you and your siblings existed, there was no reason not to bring him in.  It was difficult to track him though, given the Fereldan ban on Wardens and the low number of our order there.  The Warden Commander was given an order to find you, but it was apparently ignored.  Of course the Blight complicated things.”

Varric asked this time, “Is that how you found them in Denerim.  Did Meriden…”

Janeka frowned, her annoyance plain.  “No.  Our information had to come from another source.  Meriden was disinclined to share her knowledge of your whereabouts. As was your king, who forgets as he sits on his padded throne that one never leaves the Wardens.”

“Janeka,” Durstan interrupted.  “He is a king.  He cannot treat with the Wardens as if he were a lieutenant.  It would be treason to Ferelden.”  Aeryn thought he looked deeply disturbed by Janeka’s insinuation that Alistair was derelict to his duty.  The mage shrugged his objection off, though.

Well, that was nice to know.  Though they’d have to get a message to Meriden and Alistair that they had a spy in their midst.  “He’s not my king,” was all she said aloud and felt Sebastian shift behind her.  

 Pushing back the distraction, she focused on Janeka.  The mage’s features were smooth and her control was evident, but there were cruel lines carved alongside her mouth.  Hard to hide what you are when even your skin tells, Aeryn mused and looked up at Fenris, who was prodding her foot with his.

“We need to reconsider,” he said grimly.

“Yeah,” she agreed with him, glad to see he needed no encouragement to speak this time. 

“We are not releasing Corypheus.” Fenris straightened before he spoke loud enough to be heard by the group and Janeka snarled.

“Fools, you are wasting our chance!”

“Perhaps, but better to mistake and leave him imprisoned than risk what might come with him free.”

“I want to know what Meriden and Alistair think of this.  We’ll just reset the seals and as soon as we can we’ll come back.”

“NO!  The seals are too weak!  The prison will not hold him anyway.  If we release him now while he’s weak, we can control him.”  Janeka’s hands clenched around her piked staff with white knuckles. She moved to swing the staff in Aeryn’s direction only to have it checked aside by a long, dark blade.

“No.  You will not strike at these people.”

“You cannot stop me!”

“He controls you, Janeka, and I am sorry I did not see it before.  The First has the right of it.  We should never have allowed you to go so far.  These people are in danger because of you not the magister.”  Durstan turned his scarred face away from the mage and moved to stand behind Larius and the other two followed him with small bows to their former commander.  

“You will regret this, all of you!”  Her first spell launched without warning and aimed at her own former comrades, a crushing prison that left Alec clearly dead and the other two reeling.

Janeka was strong, almost unnaturally so.  Her magic, lightning and ice and crushing force, seemed to come from all quarters as her dwarven accomplices struck viciously.  Fenris took a blade to the thigh and Bethany was forced to heal him before the blood loss felled him.  Varric took a defensive stance over the two while Sebastian cleared out a path between the others and the mage with rapid fire, the string humming beneath his fingers. 

Roland forced Jankea into a corner, trying to reason with her and paying for it with his life as she bloomed ice in his veins, shattering him from within before Aeryn could get to him to yank him away.  Janeka’s Carta assassin launched into her and she had her hands full, keeping his blades from her throat. 

Durstan nearly had her.  “Durstan…wait.  I can’t...”  He pulled his sword away only to try and correct when she showed her hand with a smile.  Too late. 

  He died with a Carta blade in his back.  The dwarf rounded, allowing Janeka to refresh herself with a vial of glowing lyrium.  

From the step he was sighting from, Sebastian saw her exposed throat as she drank and made the shot as reflexively as he breathed.  Janeka dropped the vial from nerveless fingers, lyrium splattering its lurid glow across the ground, scrabbling at the crimson tipped pinions that had destroyed her throat.  The arrow kept her pinned to the wall as Aeryn stood before her, having dispatched the last of the dwarves, a cruel smile on her lips as she watched Janeka bleed out.  The mage’s green eyes flared…but it was only a final attempt at a healing spell that came too late, too weakly.  Janeka’s mouth fell slack.

“It was a damned nice shot, Vael.” Varric held his eye for a moment and Sebastian nodded.  It had been necessary. He bowed his head.  “Maker guide her safely, bewildered and misguided though she was in life.”

Next to Aeryn, Fenris murmured.  “I am sorry, Hawke.  I thought that it was best to follow her.”

Aeryn leaned against his shoulder and Fenris frowned.  He could feel exhaustion trembling under her skin as she leaned against him and he readjusted his stance to bear her weight if only for a moment.  “So did I.”

Larius hovered at the edge of their circle, glancing over his shoulder as if he could not believe that they had defeated Janeka. “Hawke, the final seal is this way.  I believe it will only take one more effort on your behalf.”

Father’s voice whispered and she forced herself not to go rigid as for the first time, the words came clear.   _Ah.  Of course.  Wasn’t it always the way?_

“Right.  Let’s bloody well get this over with.”

Aeryn paused again at the edge of the dias. Turning over her Father’s words in her mind.

“Are you…” Sebastian sighed.  “No, I do not suppose you are alright at all.”

“Something’s…off here, love.  But I don’t know what else to do.”

His hand was warm on the back of her neck.  “You do what you must.  As you always do.”

Aeryn hesitated before she asked.  There didn’t seem to be any other option, but still…he’d know.  “I…is this right?  If the Maker cursed him, do I have the right to kill him?”  

He blinked at her a moment.  _Why would she…Ah._  “I can’t tell you the Maker’s mind, but I do not believe He would want us trapped like this.  If this is the way to end this…”

“I have to get us out of here.”  Her voice was a bare whisper.

“I would do it for you, if I could, _à ruin_.  I would not see another ounce of your blood spilt over this debacle.”

“But mine’s the blood that matters today.”  She gave him a corner of her smile and straightened her shoulders.  “I love you, Sebastian.”

_Wait, what?_ ”Aeryn?”

“It’s not going to be just a little this time.” Before he could grab her, she’d slipped from his grip and sprinted to the middle of the dias and held out the Key.  This time the connection was almost instantaneous and the flare of it threw Sebastian off of his feet.  He pushed up to see…

No mere strands of red this time, the whole connection was crimson blood streaming from her fingertips.  

“More…we must release him and kill him once and for all.” Larius shouted over the dull roar of the magic.

“NO!  Aeryn…” But she’d turned the blade towards herself and it gouged down her arm as it was pulled into the light.  

And this time when the light dissipated, it was no mere demon standing before them.

It was Corypheus.  

“Holy Shit.”  Varric was standing beside Sebastian, but Sebastian was focused only on the small still figure yet hunched in the middle of the cracked stone, trying to push herself back to her feet.

Corypheus’ voice thundered around them.  “What are you that you do not kneel before your betters?”

Aeryn felt hands on her and opened her eyes to see Sebastian’s worried face.  She swallowed back bile before she could manage, “I’m alright.  Give me a second.  Did it work?”

“Not exactly.  We did release it…but…”  He had a bandage out, wrapping it around her arm though the blood was no longer flowing, already clotting in fact.  She sipped at a vial of restorative, but it did little to bring any color back to her lips.  He wanted to shake her for her recklessness…but she was right, there hadn’t been  a choice.

Catching Fenris’ worried eyes, Aeryn gave him a nod.  
 She was as well as she could expect.  A little flow of Bethany’s warm magic over her skin got her up on her feet when Sebastian offered his hand.  

Corypheus was speaking again and this time, seeing that Aeryn was alive, Sebastian could focus on what it said.  “The City was wrong…it was black and empty.  There was nothing to be found…”

The City of the Maker?  The Golden City?  That couldn’t be right.  Evil tricks meant to sap faith.

“You will not take me to the light?  Then I will use you to fuel my release instead.”

Magic flooded the room, blocking the last exit behind them and turning the seal room into a deadly arena.

It was a grinding sort of fight.  Just when they thought they’d made progress, Corypheus would sap another seal and steal magic from it.  The only answer was to destroy the seals first.

It was an answer which held its own dangers.  Each was defended by a set of shades. And while these were foes they had plenty of experience with, Corypheus was gaining power as he recovered from his long incarceration and they were all tiring.

Bethany fell first; a bolt of electricity turning the air around her purple before she hit the ground.  Varric stood over her daring Corypheus to get near enough to finish.  “She’s breathing, Hawke, but…”

“Just cover her, Varric. “ No time to check on her as unholy fire swept the room again.  

A falling chunk of stone sent Sebastian flying.  Before he could correct his direction he was slammed into one of the electrified pillars.  He laid crumpled and silent, his eyes shut and a sickly yellow color on his skin. Aeryn managed to drag him away from the pillar; his pulse was jittery but reassuringly strong.  She couldn’t stay to wake him, barely dodging another crashing stone with a leap to the side.

Fenris and Varric went down almost immediately thereafter, a wave of magical flame engulfing them and Aeryn launched herself into shadow, hoping to catch her breath.

“All alone.  All alone, little bird.”

But Corypheus was flagging too, unexpectedly.  Before she fell, Bethany had done her best to sap his mana in shields defending against her attack.  Half of his hideous face was shredded and his jaw was exposed and crooked and Fenris had broken his shoulder, leaving a withered arm dangling.  There were gaping wounds where Varric and Sebastian’s rune charmed arrows had dug into flesh, her poisons rotting the skin around them.

The magister had several of her throwing knives embedded, one in his eye blinding his sight on that side.  Aeryn had severed both of his hamstrings on the last pass…not that it helped to slow him, but gore was pooling wherever Corypheus hovered.

Whatever he was, he wasn’t a healer.  He seemed to gain some strength from their weakening bodies, but as they faded, so did he now that he was shut off from the seals.  It was a fine line she had to tread.  She might wait too long and leave the others too weak.

In a flying dash, Aeryn buried her father’s Key in the ragged skin covering Corypheus’ chest.  If the magister had a heart, though, she’d missed it. He didn’t even bother to pluck it out before he struck again but she’d disappeared before he could track on her and the spell flew wild.  

All of her advantage lay in surprise, she couldn’t let him get a hold on her or they were finished.  

She hung in shadow, calling up that still quiet part of her that could ignore the silent deadly flames creeping towards Sebastian and the others.  She couldn’t hear her father anymore either.

Ice and hunt and blade and bone.   She’d attached an incendiary bomb to the Key, but hadn’t been able to break the glass to blend the explosive.

Magebane hadn’t been as effective as it should have been and she was out anyway.  She had one tiny vial of the blended nerve toxin she’d used on Anders.   She hadn’t been able to find a few of the ingredients she needed in Ferelden to brew more.  A priority now that they were back In the Marches.  

Well.  Assuming they lived longer than the next few minutes.  One mustn’t assume.  

Suppressing a giggle of hysteria, as blood loss and exhaustion drew creeping fingers through the sharp divide of her mind, Aeryn skirted the edge of the room to avoid the flickering tongues of electricity reaching out for her.  Her leg was numb along the outside where she’d brushed too close once.   

He called out mockingly, materializing right over Bethany.  “This little bird doesn’t have the father’s steel.  He left that to you, didn’t he?  All steel.  No heart.  Else you’d be dragging your lover from the flames eating his body instead of worrying about me.”

But Hawkes were bred tricky.  Bethany, seemingly limp and unconscious, had been watching and waiting too; eking the last dregs of her energy out.  Force was her specialty now, but it didn’t mean she neglected other schools.  Under cover of her robes, her fingers moved and her mana focused.  Intent, Aeryn watched, creeping closer.  Once she had trained to be attuned to the way Beth’s mana built.  They’d fought together often enough now that she’d relearned the feeling. She needed to launch just as…

Now.  

Ghostly white hands ripped through the Veil to catch at Corypheus’ body, yanking it still and spreading it open to Aeryn’s blades.  Wrapping her body around him, she didn’t bother to dispel the shadow from around her body and used all her own deceptive strength to dig her blades on either side of the magister’s spine and drag.  

One of the dragonbone blades was spelled with ice and poisoned, it froze the bones and leeched the nerve toxin into his system.  

Corypheus howled and writhed in the otherworldly grip, the toxin only deadening his control, lightning shattering the air around them.  Thunder and hideous pain rang in Aeryn’s ears.  Bethany collapsed underneath them, her spell dissipated like smoke.  

But it was too late.  Aeryn had her knives in him now.  She couldn’t draw them across his throat, couldn’t feel the unnatural life bleed out of him, but she could finish him, nonetheless.

Her other blade was rune-marked with a special rune.   Sandal never told her what it did, exactly, never quite able to explain it in his vague, meandering way.  Sometimes it reacted strangely but it always responded to her need. This time it rang with force to shatter the frozen bones into fragments.  As Bethany’s spell faded, as her own breath and her heartbeat stuttered, Aeryn thrust the daggers again, until the pale blades jammed together and she levered them back towards herself.  

With a grunt, she dug Corypheus’ spine out of his body even as he l _aughed ._  The Key in his chest exploded finally, stinking black smoke stinging her eyes as it flung her backwards; cruel, bewildering laughter ringing in her ears

The magister fell to the ground in a squidgy thud of shattered bone and rotting meat.  She forced herself to her feet as the spells fell silent around her, the ancient consciousness that had maintained them gone.  

Larius strode into the room, his voice sounding strangely triumphant and coherent, even through the deadened sound of the eardrum Corypheus had shattered.  “You did well, Champion.  Thank you.  Your services will not be forgotten.”

Aeryn stared at him disbelievingly.  She didn’t need her Father’s voice prodding her to tell her something was wrong.   

She lived in disguises.  Larius’ whole body had changed stance.  His voice was wrong.  His eyes focused differently.  Wrong.  Oh, Maker, no. “ _No_.”

Stumbling, Aeryn tried to force her body to listen but she was at the end of her reserves, every limp muscle screaming with the effort to keep her upright.  The room spun.  She’d barely dragged her feet a few steps, feeling like the shards of her ribs were being driven into her lungs with every breath, when the Warden Commander’s body disappeared into the storm suddenly raging around them.   _No…_

Sebastian’s eyes opened as rain pelted his face and he rolled over with a groan.  He’d landed on the spine of his bow and a deep bruise…surely only a bruise and not a break…was throbbing. His skin felt stretched taut and nerves screamed from the heat of the fire that had singed the edges of his armor and burned away his spare quiver as he struggled to stand.  Nothing but the sounds of storm around him.  

The battle was over, but who had won?

Fenris and Varric lay a few feet to his side and he could see Fenris blinking, at least and Varric pushing himself to his feet. _Aeryn…where was_ …he looked up, searching as he pushed sodden hair out of his eyes.  

The magister lay in a gruesome heap and he found the strength to offer up a prayer of thanks…but where was…He found her staggering towards the walkway they’d climbed so recently and used one of the jagged mounds of rock to lever himself up.  “Aeryn…”

“No…”

Hand over hand and staggering on his feet Sebastian managed to drag his protesting, reluctant body across the arena to her side as Aeryn collapsed to the ground, lingering shadow guttering out around her.  Her hair was singed nearly to her scalp on one side, a line of blistered skin where a lightning bolt had run a glancing blow across her face.  Trails of blood down her ears and her nostrils.  “Maker… _Bethany_.”  Sebastian fell back to his knees beside her and called to her sister while he fumbled for a potion bottle at his waist with wooden fingers, trying to wedge it between her lips and force her to drink.  

Her hand clutched at his as he cradled her head against his thigh.  “Stop…”

“Aeryn, you need…”  He tried to haul her out of the rain that was soaking her legs and splashing up onto her face but only managed to drag her limp form a few inches before his strength gave out. “Fenris, give me a hand!” The elf groaned behind them as he moved.  

“ _Stop_ him…” Aeryn was still trying to make him listen.

“Who? Corypheus?  He’s dead.  Drink this…”

“Don’t…”  She coughed wetly, choking around the potion he managed to dribble into her mouth, and tried to push him off.  “Don’t _let_ him…”  Blood was crusted under her eyes, turning the sockets gory.  Rain sliding like bloody tears down her cheek just as her swollen, bruised eyelids fluttered shut.

 


	27. Chapter 27

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Thanks to jillyfae for her beta and atomicpen for her cheerleading, though of course all mistakes are my own._

Bethany was moving, forcing her exhaustion down along with her terror.  Her last memory before she’d passed out was of her sister, panic edging in on her focus, desperately struggling to defeat the monster that had nearly killed them all.

Aeryn might not have any time, but what Bethany could buy her with her own limited skill, she would. She limped over to Aeryn, draining the last of the restorative from a vial.

"Get her out in the rain."

Sebastian stared up at her blankly, his hands still cradling Aeryn’s head against his thigh as the wind buffeted them.  “What?”

"We have to get that tainted ichor off of her.  She's injured badly, but if that gets into her blood she's finished. We have to get her washed off."

Between them all they managed to shift Aeryn into the storm.  Varric grumbled under his breath wondering how someone so damned little weighed so much.

Lightning illuminated the burn across Aeryn’s cheek and a scrap of dark red hair fell away, strands sticking to her blistered skin, some whirling away in the wind. Bethany brushed her fingers to the sharp bone and pulsed a bit of healing magic across the wound, rendering the skin smooth and clear again. She laughed a little inwardly. Vanity maybe, if they'd been too late.

She fought to keep terror beaten back as she used a rag to wipe the remaining blood from Aeryn’s face and arms.  It was likely they were too late. It had been a bloody battle. There had been blood in Aeryn’s eyes and her mouth and soaking into the exposed wounds showing through the battered leathers.

It would take a miracle. She glanced over at Sebastian, a grey tone to his skin, whispering prayers under his breath while he helped her.  She’d been raised to believe in miracles, but…

Father had always said miracles were hard work combined with luck and a little desperation.  Bethany uncorked a lyrium potion and chugged it down, metallic and sweet and cold and felt mana burn down her spine to flare at her fingers.

Time to work.

By unspoken agreement Sebastian, Fenris, and Varric were seeing to each other with more conventional cures; potions and bandages, while Bethany concentrated on Aeryn.  None of them moved out of the rain though, staying close to hand.

Bethany focused, remembering the way her sister’s body was supposed to feel under her hands.  Ribs were broken again, no surprise there.  Cracked bones in both hands.  Cracked skull.  Bleeding under the skin somewhere.  Blood trails down her ears indicated a broken eardrum, at least.  All of it fixable, if she had strength enough.  The bloody eyes worried Bethany more, an indication that the electricity had damaged things she couldn’t see.  Not to mention the exhaustion that had been evident before.  Not to mention that Aeryn’s head hadn’t been quite straight, even when her skull had been whole.

 _No, stop, don’t worry about things you can’t know yet. Fix what you see._  And she ignored the fact that it was Anders’ coaching she was following.

Magic flowed.  Ribs set and at least that horrible sucking sound when Aeryn breathed had stopped.  She asked Sebastian to dribble healing potion into Aeryn’s mouth again and he worked slowly, rubbing the bruised throat to work a swallow reflex, murmuring prayers.  Fenris and Varric straightened Aeryn’s fingers, Varric wincing at the horrid feel of bone creaking under skin and Fenris’ face hard and stoic to allow Bethany to set them.

The cracked skull…Maker.  If there was swelling, Bethany couldn’t see.  Couldn’t tell _.  I’m not a healer.  I don’t know._   Her breath shook as she dragged mana from what felt like the roots of her toenails and Fenris set another lyrium potion in her fingers with something in his gaze that chilled her bones and straightened her spine, at the same time.

 _Are you alright,_ that gaze asked, not gently. _Can you do this?_

She drank the potion and he dipped his chin in a small nod.

Sebastian wavered as he sat on his heels and Varric wedged his solid form against the other archer.  “Steady, kid.  We’ve got more to do.” He waited until Sebastian shook himself, took another sip of restorative tonic and continued ministering to his Hawke, before asking, “You okay, Sunshine?”

“Soldiering on.”

“I’m going to get our tents set up, get a fire going.”

“No.”  Fenris had his head down now, fiddling with the end of a bandage wrapped around his wrist, dark blood leaching through the damp cotton.

“Broody...”

Fenris drew himself up.  “We need to be away from here.  The structure is unstable and the Veil is weak.  If Bethany must do much more magic, we will end up having to fight again.  And I do not think we are up to more than…oh, a shade or two.”  He gave a thin smile and Varric acknowledged the fact with a weak chuckle.

“Well, there’s the understatement of the age.”

Fenris turned back to Bethany.  “How long before we can move her?”

“A day or so,” she began but interrupted his protest, “but you’re right.”  He was.  She could feel things moving just beyond the Veil and it was distracting her.  “Give me an hour.  Boil some water, get a tarp up.  We’ve got to get her clean and dry as soon as we can.  And you all need to eat before we march, otherwise I’ll be burning mana on you, instead.”

They moved to do her bidding.  The tarp went up first and Bethany stripped the last of her sister’s armor piling it to the side.

She sat her hand on her sister’s chest to feel the heartbeat, too fast and shallow.  Just as she moved again Aeryn’s hand flashed and grabbed her.  She looked up into strange eyes, the pupils dilated to pinpricks from magic, stress and too much potion.  And…madness, maybe. Or perhaps it was just the pale irises gleaming from the bloody whites.  “Aeryn!”

Three male heads snapped around to look at the sisters.

She didn’t stop.  Aeryn’s hand was small, but Bethany had slim wrists and she gasped under the pressure her sister exerted, a dark curl of a smile on her chapped, split lips and one dogtooth showing.

“Aeryn.” Sebastian was at their side with his hand over Aeryn’s where the bones of Bethany’s wrist were starting to creak from Aeryn’s cruel grip.  “Let go, now.  Aeryn, let go!” He snapped the order and her sister’s eyes shifted from where she’d had Bethany trapped like a rabbit by a viper to his. Bethany breathed in.  

“She hurt me.” The pressure eased but she didn’t release Bethany’s wrist.

“She’s trying to help.  Just let go.” he urged, trying to keep a soothing tone in his plea.

“Where’s Anders?”

“He…he didn’t come with us this time, remember?” Sebastian pried Aeryn’s fingers away and held them tight in his own.

“I can wait, let’s go.” Aeryn jerked as if she was trying to get to her feet, but her body wouldn’t obey, strength failing her again and Sebastian released her hand to grab her shoulders.  

“Aeryn, this isn’t Kirkwall.  Let your sister work.”

Bethany tried not to be hurt by the disappointment on Aeryn’s face.  Delirium wasn’t uncommon with head injuries and she and Anders had fought together for years.  It had been a long time since she’d been hurt so badly and not had nearly instant relief.   Excuses for her sister threw themselves up at her.

“But I need to go…let me…he’s getting away!” The last of her brief flare of energy burned out, her voice fading to a whimper and her eyes rolling back.  

Bethany had taken the moment to sip at another lyrium draught.  This one was weaker than the last, but it was all she had.  She caught Fenris’ eye.  “See if Aeryn has anymore in her kit?”  

He hesitated but went to the pile of Aeryn’s gear to rummage through the potion pouch that was never far from her.  He found two of the slender vials, glowing faintly.  Bethany reached for one and he gave it to her, with a grimace.

Varric called out from where he was tending the fire.  “Taste it first.  Hawke doesn’t always label her tricks.”

“What do you mean?”

“I can think of one or two times she ‘accidently’ dropped a lyrium potion and allowed an enemy to pick it up only to find that it had been laced with magebane.”  Fenris looked as if he was recalling a memory and couldn’t decide if it was happy or not.  

Her eyes wide at the implication of such a nasty substitution, Bethany stuck a finger in the liquid and sniffed before she touched it to her tongue.  She’d tasted Aeryn’s magebane once or twice.  That concoction had a flavor of lemon and clover; it was almost pleasant.  This had the burn of metal in winter.  “It’s right,” she assured them before corking the vial again and turning back to Aeryn.  

Now, Bethany needed to go deeper.  She healed the broken vessels making Aeryn’s eyes so eerie first.  Next time they opened, she wanted to see her sister looking back and not...whatever it was that had been staring out from her sister’s eyes.   _Not the taint.  It wasn’t._ If positive thinking could make it so.

Bone and blood and sinew.  Knitting.  Making weak seams tighter.  Down and down until... _it won’t be enough, little Hawke.  She’ll die and they will blame you, these men who love her so._

Fenris and Varric exchanged looks as the magic glowed brighter and then vividly green.  Sebastian was too caught up in his worry to notice the change, to see when Bethany stopped relying on her vision, on touch, and closed her eyes, one hand on her sister’s forehead.  

Elf and dwarf both saw Bethany’s warm skin grey out  as she drained her mana dry chasing Hawke’s injuries.  

“Sunshine, stop!”

Fenris was in motion, though, quick as a cat and, clutching Bethany’s shoulders, was about to shake her when her brown eyes snapped open, pupils blown huge and dark.  “I won’t,” she whispered, raggedly.

“No.  You will not.” he agreed.  “You are stronger than that.”

She slumped against him and Fenris bore her weight, helping her sink to the ground to rest more gracefully than she’d have managed on her own.

Sebastian was startled out of his careful tending.  “What’re you doing?”

Bethany looked up from resting her forehead against her knees. “I can’t.  I’ve done everything I can, for now.”

His eyes narrowed and, in her weakened state, a sense of being impaled on his sharp vision crashed over her in a wave.  

“I have to stop, Sebastian.”

“She is still in danger.  You cannot just _stop_.”  

“I have to.”  Bethany kept her gaze steady on his even as his features went hard and austere with anger.  

“D’ya have any idea at all how often she’s burned herself to cinders for you?  How can you do less for her?”

Bethany firmed her chin.  “Because I know my _limits_.”

Fenris almost intervened, but he saw Sebastian stop to truly look at the mage.  The moment that sense caught up with his fear for Hawke.  The archer’s frame collapsed and he nodded, holding up his hand in a gesture of conciliation.  “I...forgive me, Bethany.  I understand.”  

Varric handed Bethany a tin mug of thin soup and she sipped, after a grateful nod.  He crouched down by Aeryn, rubbing his forehead wearily before he ran a hand over her head.  “I think I’ll trim this up for her, before she wakes up.”

“I was not aware you were a purveyor of ladies’ hairstyling, Varric.”  

“Broody, I have all sorts of skills that I haven’t shared with you all.”  He glanced over at Sebastian and jerked his head.  “Go eat. I’ll keep an eye on her while you warm up and then we better get moving if we’re going.  Light’s not going to last much longer.”

They didn’t bother to put the fire out behind them.

Taking turns, they hauled Aeryn’s unconscious body behind them on a hastily improvised travois, but the going was slow between her weight, their weariness, and the rugged terrain once they left the path.  The walls loomed over them, fading light reflecting in blues and dusky purples on the jagged stone, casting eerie shadows.  Once, they caught the lashing tail of a lion disappearing around the edge of a crevasse, hiding from their noise.

They were barely two miles down the canyon towards the path out when she began thrashing.

Fever burned under her skin and Bethany touched the blankets around Aeryn with frost before trying to find the source for the infection.  

“It’s not the darkspawn taint, is it?” Sebastian asked her worriedly, as he picked up Aeryn’s hand to examine her nails and check the pale blue veins running under her skin for the tell-tale grey.  

Bethany shook her head, “I...don’t think...” _ah, there_ as she sent a thread of healing into her sister’s gut.“No, there was something internal.  I’ve fixed it. I hope.  But let’s give her the last of that healing draught.”

They paused for a moment to allow the spell and potion to work and to drink the last of their water.  Sebastian forced himself away from Aeryn to trudge to the top of a carved out mesa to overlook the area.  In the final gleams of light, he could just make out an edge of silver against a smudge of trees.  “There’s water, about a mile farther.”

“Let’s hope it’s palatable.  Is it safe to go on?”  Fenris asked Bethany.

She shrugged.  “We need water, so does she.  Magic won’t matter either way if we don’t have it and I don’t have the mana to keep making ice.”  

He took up the brace of the travois and with Varric and Sebastian pushing behind, they managed to make it up the slope and, finally, out of the grim canyon.

Aeryn was awake...well, her eyes were open, Bethany noted… when they got to a decent campsite inside a grove of pine trees and backed up to a granite outcropping.  She laid still and silent as they made camp, not answering Sebastian when he spoke and eyes unfocused and distant.

“She’s dreaming, I think.”  Varric told him as he settled down on his haunches beside her to take care of her hair.  

“With her eyes open?”

“She did down in the Deep Roads.  Too wary to close her eyes and too tired not to sleep.” He pulled a comb, a pair of sharp, slender scissors and a straight razor out of his pack, but glancing at Aeryn, Varric set it out of her reach.  Gently, he combed what was left of her bangs, curling and damp against her forehead.  “Fever broke anyway.”  Sebastian brushed her forehead with a kiss and left him to work, turning to help Fenris stake the tentpoles.  Varric squeezed her shoulder, “That’s my girl, Hawke.  You keep fighting, we’ve got your back.”  

She blinked slowly, once then twice and closed her eyes as her friends made camp around her.

000000

Aeryn fell into a healing sleep this time and after her haircut, Sebastian carried her into the tent and dropped at her side, his tousled head bowed over her hand in both of his.  

Bethany brought him a bowl of soup and some of the camp bread that Fenris stirred up and baked quickly on a stone.  She folded back the tent flap and was rather struck by them, haloed in a circle of light thrown by the brazier.  They fit together, those hands.  Her sister's, capable and deadly though it was on its own, looked safe there.

Waiting until he paused in his prayer she chided, "You should rest, too, Sebastian. Aeryn won't be gentle with me if she wakes to find you've taken ill because you didn't tend to your own needs."

He glanced up at her and she was shocked to see tears in his reddened eyes and the remnant of more dashed away before she'd pushed back the tent flap.  He was ashen under the warm complexion, evidence of exhaustion, shock and fear.  "She's alright, I promise." Hesitating only a moment, she clasped his shoulder in comfort and pulsed a restoration spell through his frame.  Just a small one.  She was tired, too.

She'd seen the arrow tattooed on Aeryn's ring finger and had no doubt as to what it meant to her sister.  This was her brother, lacking only the brief, public ceremony.

The hand that suddenly clutched hers had desperation in its grasp. "Are you sure, Bethany?"

It was so easy to forget that Sebastian had lost his family no less than three times. Once was his own doing, to be sure. But then twice to treachery, he'd had the people he'd loved and lived with ripped from him cruelly and utterly. So many ashes Sebastian Vael had wept over.

And now the woman he loved had brushed the edge of the Void with more than a fingertip. Bethany stepped closer. "I swear to you, she shows no sign of being tainted, by some miracle."

Her brother, this blue eyed man. He leaned against her thigh and she brushed a wayward lock of russet hair out of his face. Carver had always kept his blue-black hair short and soldier-like, same as Aeryn.  She wondered what he'd have looked like with it longer, what he would have looked like with the character of maturity written on his features as they were with Sebastian. "And now you need your sleep, as well, brother. So that when she wakes you can keep up with her."

Jarred out of his worry, Sebastian was about to correct her use of his Chantry title, only to pause when surprise warred with the lingering fear and won. "Am I _your_ brother, then?"

Bethany brushed the inked feather on Aeryn's skin and was gratified by the twitch she saw. Aeryn's reflexes were coming back nicely. "She makes us family. She's good at family. The only times she's ever faltered is when she's tried to do without."

The hint bloomed into a sweet smile. Holy Andraste, no wonder Aeryn could barely take her eyes off his face.

"I like the sound of that." His smile contorted in a wide yawn and he flushed. "Excuse me, m'lady."

Bethany reached out and cuffed him lightly against his ear with a smile of her own.  "Sister, I mean. Will it bother her to hear me call you such, d'ya think?"

"We'll find out. Now...Fenris laid out your bedroll..."

Sebastian hesitated to ask, but, "Would it hurt her at all if I laid with her...just to sleep?"

Another new thought occurred to Bethany. She was well aware that Sebastian held back Aeryn's nightmares...how fitting, that she held away his as well.  "No, I don't think it would. So long as you sleep." She stood, Sebastian's hand supporting her ascent. "Ugh. That's where I'm headed as well. Fenris has watch."

"Then I'll bid you good night. Sister Bethany. Maker watch over you." And too tired to bother with more than unlacing his boots to tug them off, Sebastian curled around Aeryn and let the reassuring regularity of her breathing lull him to sleep.

00000000

Aeryn woke to the sound of rain thudding on the canvas, Sebastian’s deep breathing, and the slap of heavy canvas when the tent flap jerked out of Fenris’ hand in a sudden gust.  In a whisper, not bothering to lift her head, she asked, “We didn’t go after him?”

He hesitated and then ducked further into the tent, neatly sitting tailor fashioned beside her on the spelled canvas and offering her a waterskin.  While she drank, one careful mouthful at a time, he said, “Sebastian said you thought the magister escaped.  We saw his body, Hawke.  You were your usual thorough self.”

She gave a small shrug, not wanting to disturb the archer whose arm was wrapped around her middle.  “I think he possessed Larius.”

“You were delirious for a time, you realize?”

She nodded, still feeling the dregs of ill dreaming nagging her.   “I know what I saw, Fenris.”

“If he did...” Fenris shook his head, sending a spatter of rain to fall near her.  “Hawke, we are five miles from where we fought, in the midst of a thunderstorm, and he has nearly a full day on us.  We won’t find him unless he wishes it and though we are greatly recovered, I do not think we would survive another encounter.  We need another mage… and perhaps Aveline.” He mused and she huffed a laugh.

“Well, we always need Aveline.  Just let her bash through the whole bloody battle and we can all pop off for tea.” Grimacing, she added, “I hate to leave a fight half finished.”

“I know.”

“It’s going to bite us in the arse, you know that too?”

“More than likely.”

“ _Void_.  Fine, then.” She shifted over to her back and stared up at the tent’s roof; the spelled canvas barely holding in the rain.  Sebastian rearranged himself to lay against her shoulder.  “I’ll send letters to Alistair and Meridan.  They can take care of their own blighted Warden business, I suppose.”

Fenris held his tongue for a minute but Aeryn caught a sparkle of relief when he spoke in acerbic tones, “I’m glad you are not mine, Hawke.  I do not believe I could ever become used to the stress.”

Aeryn grinned, he could see even in the dim glow thrown by the brazier.  He sat his hand on her forehead, just for a second and the smile went a little softer.  “Yeah, I’m a treat, sometimes.”

They sat that way for a few moments, the sound of the rain pelting the tent slacking off to a drizzle, before Fenris moved to leave.  “I should let you get some more rest.  If you are up to it we should march a way onward come the morning.  Supplies are getting low.”

“I’ll be fit..hey, wait a moment.” She caught his hand before he stood and resignedly he sat again.  “You did good, you know, keeping them moving.  I bet they wanted to camp there., ‘til I was healed up.”

“It was proposed.”

“You got them moving.”  She hadn’t let go of his hand and finally, he squeezed her fingers.  “You did brilliantly.”

“Thank you.”

She held his gaze.  “What’s going on with you and Beth?”

Staring, his eyes caught a small fragment of light and she saw just a bit of fear and doubt there.   _Sod it._

“I do not…”

“Fenris, you are a terrible liar.  You know it, Varric knows it…most of the Free Marches knows it.  Come clean.  I may be a bit slow, but you jumped to her defense more than once down there.  What is going on?”

“We have been talking.  I…find myself…very…”  She raised an eyebrow at him and he stopped shifting.  “I am attracted to her.  She is lovely.”

“Yeah, she always has been.”  Aeryn blinked slowly, recalling.  “She’s been watching you, too.”

“Has she?” He was a little embarrassed at how eager he sounded.

“Yeah.  Thought it was just…well.” Aeryn shrugged. She had thought at first that Bethany was still wary of Fenris’ dislike of magic.  But if he was looking at her like that...maybe it was no longer an issue.  “But, okay.  Well.  Just mind your manners, she isn’t Isabela.”  She let his fingers slide from her grip.

He cocked his head at her, bangs falling askew.  “Really?”

“Really, what?”

“That’s it?  No…keep your fingers away from my sister or…?”  Fenris was rather unprepared for the way ice formed in Hawke’s gaze.

“What?  You don’t…sodding _Void_ , Fenris.  You are…exactly why _wouldn’t_ I be over the moons that you were…ah…attracted to her?”

“I’m an elf.”  He reminded her bluntly.  “And an ex-slave.”

“And I’m a murderous, violent thief but I don’t see you hauling your friend Sebastian away from me to save _his_ honor.”

“That is…”  He almost had to laugh at the ferocity that flashed across her sweet face.  Hawke didn’t stand for anyone denigrating her friends, not even themselves.

“Absolutely not different at all.  Give over, Fenris.  You know I love you.”

Mortified at the blush that heated his cheeks, he sputtered. “Hawke, I…”

She patted his foot fondly.  She knew.  Hopefully he’d get over that reticence with Beth, though.  “I’m tickled.  I hope it works out.”  She smirked up at him.  “Of course I’m obligated to separate you from your cock if you hurt her in any fashion she can’t deal with herself.”

“Of course.”

“ _And_ I’ll tell Isabela.  ‘Bela was always over-fond of Bethany.”

“She was.”  Fenris picked himself up off the floor.

Just before he got away, she called out softly, “Mind the lightning, though.” She was gratified to hear him choke a little.

The warm bulk beside her shifted and Sebastian chuckled against her ear.  “You shouldn’t tease him.”

“Yes, I should.  It’s good for him.”  She rolled over gingerly, but while Aeryn was so stiff she felt as if she’d been starched, there wasn’t a significant amount of lingering pain.  Sebastian’s eyes were half lidded, bloodshot as if he’d caroused all night, and he smelled a bit ripe but in all likelihood she smelled worse, Aeryn figured.  Tucking her arms under and around him, she smiled.  “Hullo, there.”

Bright eyes shone with tears suddenly and he squeezed them shut as her heart seized.  “Oh.  Oh, Sebastian, sweetheart, don’t.”  She pressed her forehead against his and kissed the bridge of his nose.  “I’m alright.”  One salty drop ran down the line of her lip, tickling, and she brushed it aside even as she cupped his scratchy cheek; kissing his cheekbones before pressing a featherlight kiss to his mouth.  “I am.”

Sebastian opened his eyes again and managed to reply thickly, “I know.  But it was a close run thing _a ruin_ and you scared me badly. I’m just grateful…”  His lips tickled against hers and he tightened his arm around her and buried his head in her neck, his mouth against her pulse, strong and just a bit faster than his own.

His shoulders shook under her hand and she whispered to him, “It’s alright, shh.”  Her fingers speared through his hair as she murmured comfort into his ear and when his hand mirrored hers and cupped the back of her skull, she realized.  Her hand flew to her hair…or where her hair had been.  “ _Oh_.”

Forcing himself to release her, frightened that he’d inadvertently hurt her, Sebastian saw shock rather than pain as she fingered the close shaved area and the old white scar, before finding it longer again at the top of her head and cropped on the other side.  “Your hair was burned,” he said quietly.  “Bethany could fix the injury but not the hair.  Varric made it neat as he could.”

Aeryn nodded, a little wide eyed.  “Varric?  Well.  A dwarf of infinite talent.  Have you a mirror?”

“In my pack.” He sat up and rummaged through it to pull out the bit of glass he used to shave.

She turned her head one way and the other.  Her face and neck were mottled with yellowing bruises, which wasn’t an unusual sight, all told, but her hair was... _ugh_.   _Maker, I’m vain.  “_ It’ll grow back.” she said, somewhat tremulously and cast him a halfsmile.  “I’ve done it worse myself a few times.”

He saw her hesitation and kissed her forehead as his finger stroked along the scar that ran the crown of her skull.  “Your hair’s so thick normally, I’ve hardly even felt this.”

“Ostagar.”

 _Holy Andraste._  She’d told him that the darkspawn had taken her down, that Carver had rescued her.  But that scar told of a grievous wound.  How close had she come to death then, before he’d even met her?  “It’s a neat scar though. Mended well.  Did you find a healer?”  Sebastian asked curiously, despite himself.

“Carver actually was a pretty good hand with a needle.  Mother made him mend his own things, usually, since he went through them so fast. He stitched me up and we found elfroot along the way, willow bark.  I don’t…I really don’t remember much of the scramble back to Lothering.”  She confessed.   Tilting the mirror again, she snagged her lip between her teeth before recalling, “And I bashed my head in once not long after Anders joined us, about a month before I met you.  Just a concussion but…I always wondered if he…fixed something I couldn’t see.  I got a little better, after.  It was easier to sleep.  I wasn’t so on edge all the time.”

He cupped her head again, the short stubble velvety against his palm.  She looked somehow older and terribly vulnerable, tip-tilted eyes huge in her pale face.  Sebastian had to fight back the urge to crush her against him again, to hide her away from anything that could harm her.  She wouldn’t thank him for it.  “Then I have something to be grateful to him for, again.”

She leaned into the caress with a sigh and then snorted when her belly rumbled.  “Flames, I’m starved.  Any chance of something to eat, do you think?”

“There was soup earlier.” He tugged his boots on. “Come on then, I’ll help you get dressed and bring you some.”

Rolling her eyes, Aeryn pushed him off.  “I can dress myself just fine, love.  I’ll be out in a moment. A little air would be nice.”

Sebastian hesitated but gave her a sheepish grin when she arched an incredulous eyebrow at him and got to his feet, groaning at his own stiffness.  He snagged his cloak from the top of his pack and slung it over his shoulders.

She watched him leave and then sighed and gave her body a good hard look.  Sebastian had touched her like she was made of blown glass and she had to admit he had reason.  There were bruises up and down her arms and her ribs were wrapped.  She recognized the creakiness in her hands as the lingering result of broken bones, though it felt like Bethany had done a fine job at getting everything back where it belonged.  Scowling in the mirror, she had to laugh.   _Well, that’s pretty._  Intimidation wasn’t going to be hard for a while.  She’d look a proper sell sword, once the bruises cleared.

Standing, Aeryn waited for the vertigo from lying down too long to clear before stretching her arms over her head and bending carefully over, testing the roll of her spine and the flex of her ribs.  She felt a little weak, but that was likely hunger.  Standing, Aeryn shook out her arms and rolled her shoulders and then closed her eyes.

Outside, Sebastian was speaking quietly, the warmth of his brogue carrying and then Varric’s answering rumble outside as a pot was scraped across stone.  The rain had dropped off.

And her head was quiet.  No lingering whispers from her father.  She wasn’t sure if she was glad or not.  Best be glad, she decided.  

Without Sebastian’s additional body heat, the tent was growing chilly and so Aeryn quickly tugged on a pair of stockings, a green woolen tunic, lacing it up to her neck, a pair of split leather trousers padded across the thighs and then the heavy jerkin lined with sheepskin before going out into the frosty night.

Her nose twitched as the scent of soup reached her, mixed with the soft pine needles that carpeted the forest floor and other woodsy smells.  Varric looked up from where he was fine tuning Bianca’s firing pin with a relieved smile.  “Hawke!  ‘Bout time.  I was almost considering getting worried.”

“Ah, Varric.  You know me.  A lady needs her beauty sleep.”  She ran her hand over the back of her skull with a smirk.  “Speaking of which...”

He shrugged.  “Well, you were due for a new look, I figured.”

“Nice.  I’ll return the favor someday.”  Closer to the fire, Aeryn gave him a good once over.  Varric looked worn through, just as Fenris had, and Sebastian as well.  She’d give odds that Bethany looked just this side of alive.  Sebastian handed her one of their tin mugs full of a warm, thin broth that smelled of onions and herbage and Aeryn breathed in deeply.  

“There’s bread as well.” he reminded her as she took a swallow and sighed contentedly.  “Would you mind if I rinsed off?”

“No.  Go on ahead, love.”  She waited until he’d stepped out of sight and heard him speak to Fenris, making rounds in the dark.  “How bad, Varric?”

“Ah, Hawke...”

“C’mon.”  She leaned in against his shoulder and ran a finger down the line of Bianca’s sight.

“Damn, you’re a wheedling thing.  Alright, yeah it was pretty bad.  Touch and go, for a while.”  He spread a thin layer of beeswax across Bianca’s stock and smoothed it in with a scrap of chamois.  “Think the lightning did you the worst, cooked you closer to medium than maybe is good for you.  But you pulled through like always.”  

“And the rest of you?” Varric sighed as he looked up into assessing grey eyes.  She always wanted an accounting.

“Fenris busted his shoulder up, but potion took care of it.  He isn’t even favoring that side, now.  Sunshine just about drained herself dry...that was the worst of it for her, near as I can tell. She was limping a little, when we got here but I think she’s just footsore.  She laid down a couple of hours ago.  Your sweet prince probably cracked a bone or two and there was a goose egg on his temple.”

Aeryn bit her lip before she asked, “No sign of any taint?”  

“You took the worst of it.  If any of us were going to, it’d be you.  So, how’re you feeling?”

She finished the mug of soup.  “Better than I’ve a right to.  I’m going to check on Beth.” She used his shoulder to push up on and let it linger there.

He patted it, soothingly.  “We’re fine, Hawke.  Might want to give us a day or so in a decent inn, when we get back to civilization.”  

“Believe it or not, Varric, I agree completely.” She grinned a little ruefully at him when he chuckled and she stepped over to the tent Bethany was using.  

Bethany was sprawled out on her back, snoring lightly, a cup of the soup abandoned to the side.  Aeryn slipped in and picked it up, moving it out of peril of being knocked over.  She tugged the blanket back into place.  Her sister’s olive skin looked yellow with fatigue and guilt fought with panic as Aeryn carefully examined her for any other signs of darkspawn corruption.  She took a deep breath trying to dispel the fear.  Beth was fine.  Just tired.  They were all tired.  No doubt about it, they’d need a good rest stop and at least a night or two off guard duty before they were fit to fight again.  She left the tent on quiet feet to find Sebastian drying his hair, waiting for her.  

“Brought you a bucket.  You don’t want to get your bandages wet, but I thought you’d enjoy a little freshening up.”

“Sounds fantastic.”

Sebastian lifted the pail with his offhand, she noticed.  She’d have to keep an eye on him.

“I’ll take next watch, Varric.” Aeryn opened her mouth to protest only to have the two men glare her into silence.  

“Hey, I’m just as...”

“Not tonight.”  Varric rumbled, authority in his glare.  “We just got you put back together.  Speaking of which,” he tapped his forehead, “You all alone up there?”

“All alone.” she assured them.  “Haven’t heard a peep since that dagger exploded.  I think it was just...an echo.  He put so much into making it, that he lingered, maybe.”

“Well, let’s give it a day, okay?”

“Yes, ser.”  She bobbed him a curtsey and Varric rolled his eyes.

“Go take your bath, Hawke.”

Sebastian sat the bucket inside the tent and went back to get them some tea while she bathed.

Aeryn shucked the heavier clothes again and gave herself a quick scrub.  Some of what she thought were bruises washed off, she noted smugly.  Good.  Not too much damage.  But then that meant Bethany had burned mana healing cosmetic things.  She brushed her fingers over her cheek.   _Could have sworn there’d been a burn._ The memory of electricity sizzling over her skin and through her veins pulled her away from the tent and back to the fight.  Back to the way...

Shaking herself out of a reverie, she tugged a short black chemise on, just in case they had to run out of the tent in an emergency.  Sebastian’s dark shape entered in while she stoked the brazier.  

“Feeling more yourself?”’

“I feel fine.  Come here and see.”  Waiting for him to set aside their cups, Aeryn slid into his arms and snuggled, setting her nose into the hollow of his sternum.  She wrapped her fingers into his tunic and pulled him down to sit with her on their pallet.  “Oh, yes.  Much better.”

Her fingers were skimming along his flat stomach, beneath the tunic.  Sebastian sucked a breath in, getting a hint of almonds and honey from Aeryn’s soap.  If Bethany had been awake, he could have asked if Aeryn should be indulging, but he wasn’t about to wake the mage.  Resolutely, he decided to try and get Aeryn to be sensible.  She was covered in bruises yet, her scalp shorn close, there were dark circles under her eyes and hollows in her pale cheeks and it was all evidence of what his insistence on going into the prison had wrought.

Weariness hadn’t slowed her clever fingers.  She’d unlaced the neck of his tunic and he had to swallow when she pressed her mouth to the hollow of his throat. He managed to protest.  “I’m a bit tired, l _eannan_.  And you should have another nap, I think.”

Pausing, Aeryn scanned his face.  Sebastian was sensitive enough to touch that rousing him didn’t usually take much effort.  And he’d been injured as well.  “Are you feeling alright?” Careful fingers brushed the remnant of a bruise where he’d slammed into stone.  There wasn’t a lump on his head any longer.  He’d been a little careful of his arm and she ran her hands down the warm skin, checking for heat that would indicate an injury or any swelling.  The sculpted muscle shifted under her touch and the clinical touch gave way to fond stroking.  He glanced up at her through his lashes and then set his hand on hers, stilling their motion.

“I’m well.  But you need rest.”  He whispered his lips down the greenish yellow bruise crowning her cheekbone.  “I felt the bones in your skull shift...the breath in your lungs seize...Aeryn...”

“But I didn't die.  I'm alive and I'm here…and Maker, Sebastian.” _I want you so much._ His reluctance was plain, though, and Aeryn sighed.   “If you really don’t want to, I’ll go to sleep.”  She leaned up and kissed his temple. “So long as you’re with me.”  Winding her arms around his neck, she tugged him down to their pallet and snuggled into the crook of his shoulder.

_Ah.  Well.  He’d gotten his way, then.  Grand._

He shifted a few moments later.  And again, trying to find a way not to…

“Love…I think perhaps some bits of you disagree with your bedtime theory.”  She sounded rather amused to his relief.

“It isn’t that I dinna want to. It’s that…”

“I mean...I know I'm not much to look at, just now. But hey, it is dark.”

Horrified, Sebastian pulled her up to him and cupped her cheek.  She was joking…but he’d heard that mocking tone before.  “Not ever.  Never think that.  If you lost all your hair, if you were scarred, when you are old, swaybacked and pot-bellied and little hairs sprouting from your withered chin…”

“Are you charming me or cursing me?” she asked dryly but with a ghost of a smile.

“I’m telling you. I will always want you, _anam chara_.  Or do you think me so shallow?”

“No, of course not.”

“I want you...I just…”

Levering up on her elbow, Aeryn smoothed her thumb across his cheekbone.  “Tell me.”  She couldn’t see his eyes clearly in the dark, but his lashes brushed her thumb as he closed his eyes before he looked up at her.

“I see the bruises and…an’ they’re my _fault_ and…”

“Wait…no.  No they are not your fault!  Sebastian, what?”

“You didn’t want to be there.  You tried…how many times, _à ruin_ , before we were trapped…to make us leave and I insisted.  And had you died, I would have led you to it an’…Aeryn, I dinna think I can watch you…lead you to fight for me…if something…if you died…nothing is worth your life.”

The trickle of warmth at the worry apparent in every line of his body struggled to keep up with the surge of anger that he would try and dictate to her.  She held her voice steady, though, when she asked, “Sebastian, say we weren’t together…if we were only friends and…you’d decided to go back to the Chantry.” He grunted and shook his head but she set her finger against his lips and frowned at him. “Or even if we were, but you decided to leave Starkhaven to its own devices.  What exactly do you think I’d be doing right now?”

“I don’t…what does that matter?”

“Do you think I’d perhaps be…oh, going to teas and bartering for silk at the market?  Hosting the occasional salon?”

“I suppose…you would be working.”

“Oh yes.  I’d be _working_.  I’d have stayed in Amaranthine or if I’d gone to Denerim, maybe I’d work for Alistair.  I had an offer once to _work_ for the Crows up in Antiva.”

Each time work left her lips it sounded bitter, but she shrugged suddenly. “Perhaps I could have done what Varric suggested and set myself up as the new Thief Master in Amaranthine.  But I would be _fighting_.  And getting hurt and fighting some more. And what cause would I be championing then?  My pocketbook?”

“Alistair would have…”

“Alistair would have set me up nobly,” she admitted.  “But in the end, I’d have still been his private assassin, taking care of things in the dark for him.”

She drew up just out of reach of his hand and settled with her chin on her knees, watching him.  Sebastian shivered as the chill of the air struck his skin without her close.

“When I was a little girl, all I wanted was to be a queen among thieves and the wicked left hand of a noble king.  Then there were years and years when all I wanted was to keep my family safe. And we all know how well that turned out.”

“None of that was your fault.”

“Maybe.  But that’s the way the cards fell.”

Sebastian couldn’t stand not being able to see her face.  Relying only on that low, controlled voice would lead him astray.  He rolled over and found a candle stub and tinderbox in his pack and provided them some light.  She waited as he resettled, candlelight flickering between them.

“What does that have to do with me perhaps leading you to your death?”

“Have I forfeited my right to choose my battles?  My cause?”  Her gaze was sharp and pointed.  “I’ve made some bloody lousy decisions, admittedly.  Have you decided I’ve no right to choose who to fight for?”  Her voice dropped dangerously.  “Because I will tell you Sebastian Vael, I may have marked you on my skin and you might be able to make me beg but I don’t recall giving you permission to decide who and what I will die for.”

He ducked his chin, wanting to appease the leashed anger in her tone, but he didn’t waver.  “Such is a prince’s duty.”

“You aren’t Prince, yet.  Is that still what you want?”

“I want to lead Starkhaven.  I believe we’re meant to fix what’s gone wrong…and I want to go home, Aeryn.”

Aeryn swallowed back a smile at the slight wistful tone that crept into his last words.  “And I want to help you do those things.  A noble cause.”  She hesitated before she whispered.    “There’s a part of me that still wants to go and hunt down Corypheus, you know.  A very large part of me that says that’s the responsible thing to do. But…I signed on to your fight.  Signed on with word and heart. And I think it’s worthy.”

“You’ve told me you don’t need an ornament as a wife.  You were right…I’d never be happy that way.   I like to fight, Sebastian.  It’s what I do. I’ve never minded a little hurt or blood.  I love using my blades and wearing them freely in good cause.  It was the only decent part of being Champion.  And I have been happier as your _rùn biodagain_ than I have been since I was a little girl pretending to be the Queen of Thieves. Will you take it away from me trying to protect me from battles that need fighting?” She closed her eyes for a moment and when she opened them they were brightly sheened.  “Because I won’t let go of it, willingly.  And I think that fight might ruin us.”

Reaching out, he ruffled his fingers through the short silky bangs that curled on her forehead.  She didn’t react to the touch, holding herself aloof still.  “I dinna want you other than you are. You are right…but you are all I have, Aeryn.  You hold the whole of my world in your hand.  Forgive me for being afraid to lose you, especially to my own poor decision.” She _was_ right, he knew.  Fear wouldn’t change that.

“I swear I won’t fail you, Sebastian.”  Her whisper was raspy and so very quiet.  But her eyes gleamed like beaten silver in the candlelight.

“That’s not…that is no’ even a _question_.  You couldna fail me, _leannan_.”

 _Yes I could.  But I won’t._ She held his gaze and her breath locked in her chest when she saw the intent in his eyes.

Sebastian wanted to go to her but there was the fact that she was still curled tight, wary. He lifted his hand and stretched it out to her. “You haven’t forgiven me.” He whispered it, warm brogue turning his plea into an invitation.

“Have you changed your mind?”

“I have.”

“And are we clear that I will fight for you, because I choose to do it?”

“We are.”  

“And next time, when I tell you something is a bad idea, will you listen to me? Because there will be times, Sebastian, when your safety will be more important than my own.”

He nearly dropped his hand.

“I will make a lousy advisor, oh prince, if you do not listen to the advice.”  Her eyes were half-lidded and dark, but steel rang behind the chastisement.   

“I cannot...” When she started to object he shook his head.  “No, I won’t promise that, Aeryn.   But I will always listen.”

She stretched out one arm and took his hand, lacing their fingers together.  Squeezing, he shifted closer to pay homage to the arrow tattooed there and then nuzzled up her palm to trail his lips from there to her wrist.  He was rewarded with a shiver and a hitched breath.  “Forgive me?” He leaned into the caress as Aeryn carded her fingers into his tangled hair.

“You fight dirty, you know.”

He took a moment to enjoy her light massage against his scalp. “I _have_ been taking lessons from the best.  Anyway, I’m not fighting.  I’m _apologizing_.”  He gave her his best charming smile.

Unable to help a chuckle at his foolishness, Aeryn’s shoulder popped as she unwound herself and stretched.  Sebastian sat back on his heels to admire the line of her and rubbed his hand across her stomach, below where her ribs were still wrapped, making her back arch.  “ _mmm_. Oh, that’s lovely.” Another twist of her spine and a few more snapping joints had her chuckling ruefully. “Alright, maybe I am a bit fragile yet.” She slid, lacking a little of her usual fluidity, to sit between his knees.  “Come kiss it away?”

He bent to press a kiss to her bruised face, to whisper down the apple of her cheek and to the upper curve of her lip.  His hands framed her cheeks and she smiled against his lips.  

“Thank you.  Much better, now.”  

“I am sorry.”

“Me, too.  I...I’m sorry things get so hard, sometimes.”  He was close enough to see the way her brow drew down. “I wish...” her chin jerked and she tried to hide from him but his grasp was firm.

“ _I_ wish I could offer you a ring and a crown and an easy walk for all the days of your life.  But that is not how the Maker has bent our path.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“I know.  He crafted you of steel and ivory, Aeryn, for reasons.  I will not forget again.”  But his hands were gentle as they traced down the lines of her arms to clasp her hands.  

She looked up into his eyes and tugged her hands away to bury them in his hair.  He was in need of a haircut, himself, but for now she’d enjoy the too long curls on his neck.  Licking the corner of his mouth, she teased before tracing the seam of his lips.  He opened to her and she pressed against the hard planes of his body, hungry and longing.  

His hand slid farther up, cupping her breast and smoothing one thumb along the curve. Aeryn caught the shadow of a fading bruise on his collarbone and frowning, feathered a kiss there, letting her lips trail and humming when he strummed across her stiffening nipple, under the tunic.  She followed the bruise to the edge of the bandage wrapped around his bicep and then shifted, to lick at his nipple.  

Sebastian gasped and then moaned, when her sharp teeth worried the nub.  His other hand shifted down to her arse and pressed her closer as she wrapped her legs around them.  She wriggled a hand between them, in order to... _ah, there we go_.  She smiled, happy and just a bit wickedly at the look, pleasure and need, that crossed his face.

“Maker...” Sebastian groaned when her fingers loosened the laces of his trousers and slid against his cock, sure and gentle.  Having calmed while they talked, he swelled again into her hand and her eyes locked on his reactions watched avidly as his mouth fell open, drawing in a deep breath.  “Aeryn...” his hips jerked as she thumbed the slit and smoothed the pre-come she found there.  “I...it’s been a few days, _à ruin_...I...”  Her hand tightened and he brought his mouth down to meet hers, her hot pointed tongue curving along his, slickly, mimicking the movement of her hand.  He fell back against the pallet and pulled her over him, maintaining just enough presence of mind not to roll over her, crush her.   _Not too rough_...but his mind blanked as she slid down his thighs and ran that wet, warm tongue along the center line of his belly, her soft breath ruffling the hair.   

 “Too long.”  She murmured before she mouthed along his stomach, urging his trousers over his hipbones and he arched up to accommodate her.  

The scent of his skin was as intoxicating as any rum she’d ever downed and her head whirled as she breathed in deeply.  As though he was the one running a fever, his skin was hot and smooth against her cheek before she ran the tip of her nose down his rigid length.  His hasty bath had left a hint of fir soap and river water lingering on his skin, but it was him, rich and musky and male, that filled her senses.  She cupped his balls, crinkling hair tickling her fingers as she rolled their weight before she licked the crown of his straining cock, following a lovely blue vein down and the ridge back up.  

His hands stroked her back and the stubble of her hair.  She couldn’t help the way her spine arched under the gentle touch and when his nails scratched lightly she collapsed, a happy hum escaping her.  Head pillowed on his stomach, Aeryn let him cater to her fondness for the brush of his callous against her sensitive skin as her hand lazily continued to fondle, running her nails along his thighs.

“Wearing out already?”  Sebastian kept his tone teasing, but braced himself to accept that she might have burned through her energy.  

“Not in the least.”   _Well, maybe a little._  Determined to enjoy the moment, Aeryn pressed herself up though and straddled him again; a throb starting to pulse through her core, impelling her to move against him. He met her with a soft thrust and another when she gasped, her hands bracing on his chest.   

Eyes on his, Aeryn tugged his hand and set it between her thighs and Sebastian could feel the promise of damp heat.  Sliding his hand into the plain linen smalls she wore, he cupped her and she thrust into his palm, curling hair tickling his palm as answering need coiled in his gut.

Sebastian could tell, though, her movements were sluggish and her normal grace was blunted. As much as she wanted, she didn’t have the stamina to take the lead. He tugged the string of her smalls, to let the fabric flutter down and kicked the trousers off his ankles finally.  He lay, fully naked, underneath her now and needing to see her, slid the tunic up until she could slide it off over her head.  

Aeryn squared her shoulders under his gaze, just in case he pulled back at the sight of her, but Sebastian wasn’t seeing bruises any longer.

He stroked a loving thumb across the crest of one plump little breast and admired the flush of desire, the dark raspberry shade of her nipples and smiled, pleased as she breathed in sharply.

Cupping one soft mound, he lifted his head to suck it into his mouth and run his tongue across the firm sweet flesh, her gasps and her fingers sliding back into his hair to press him closer, driving him.  Suckling, he pushed himself up and rearranged them until she was sitting in his lap, braced by his thighs.  Satisfied that he had her settled so he couldn’t hurt her accidentally and she could feel in control, he closed his teeth.

The electric jolt of pleasure bordering on pain drove her hips into his and they both groaned.  Aeryn slid enticingly along his cock now, so wet that he slipped easily between her spread lips.  He changed his angle just...so...and her head dropped back as his tip hit her swollen clit.  “Sebastian...”

She canted her hips again; craving the feel of him, driven to slide and crest again while Sebastian lavished attention on her breasts, sucking, nipping between them as he pressed the aching weight together, massaging. “So sweet...”

Forcing herself to keep her head up, even as sensation buffeted her, Aeryn let her hands slide down to his chest to tease his nipples, too.  A pinch had Sebastian’s hips jerking and his eyes snapped to hers.  This close they burned, searing blue rims around blackly blown pupils and she snarled, the blaze making her ache, the emptiness becoming unbearable.  He chased the snarl across her lips, the kiss turning sloppy, the need to taste, to have, to reassure finding release in thrusting tongues.

His hands traced back down the writhing line of her spine to grip her hips and lift.  His cock sprang to attention and they both groaned as she slid down, impaling herself on the long, rigid length.

Hot, slick silk clinging around him, the tang of her arousal wreathing around him, Sebastian lost himself in her response.

Aeryn tightened her fingers on the lean muscle of his shoulder, the hard, sculpted feel of his arm, dragging him closer as she rocked in the cradle of his hips.  Mouthing down his throat, Aeryn sucked a bruise on either side, matching proofs that she was still here, still his.  Sebastian’s forehead pressed against her shoulder, sticking with sweat and he turned his head to lap at the line of her throat.

Their smooth rocking rhythm started to fall apart as his climax built, threatening to race through him and Sebastian whined under his breath needing to take her with him.  His fingers slid over her ribcage, making her squirm as he dragged his fingers between them to find her.  He stroked the pad of his thumb, lightly, just so across the bundle of nerves.  Once and again until she thrust into the caress begging for more, “ _please...please_.”

Aeryn’s knees spread wide as she ground against Sebastian’s hand, as she filled herself again with his thick, rigid length.  He cradled her with his body, lending his strength, and the subtle sweetness of his care made her sob.  So hard inside of her, she could feel his heartbeat, feel all that power straining under her hands, between her thighs, as he fought to hold back and then as he murmured in broken gasps in her ear, “Come for me, ah, _anam chara_ , let me feel...”

Open mouthed and keening low in her throat, she found his lips again and he kissed back hungrily, searchingly.

Finally, finally a spiral of heat unfurled low in her belly and burned itself out up her spine, ecstasy sending her limp and Sebastian’s growl against her throat ricocheted through her as she clenched and fluttered around him, blunt nails digging into his back as he tightened his grip on her hips  and thrust raggedly into yielding, scalding bliss.  

They breathed hard as their hearts slowed, but Sebastian didn’t shift them, cuddling her to his chest.  Aeryn’s hands stroked along his broad shoulders, the long plane of his back, pliant in his arms, accepting.  She kissed his jaw and her fingers curled into his hair.  “I love you, so much.  I...was so afraid I’d lose and that you’d...” her voice choked a little and her body tensed as she forced back a lash of terror.  Squeezing her eyes shut, she could almost see the flames creeping up on him, on Fenris and Varric.  Corypheus taunting her as he hovered over Beth.  They could all have died and it would have been her fault for not...

“No, now.” Sebastian’s firm voice broke through the guilt.  “None of that. All’s well.  Shh.  You were so strong, _à ruin_.  You are always so strong...shh.”  She was exhausted, that’s all this was.  Sebastian could feel her trembling against him and her breath catching in her throat as she fought against the delayed reaction of fear and pain.  

The brazier had burned low and he rolled carefully, to slide them under the woolen blanket and their cloaks.  “Come and rest, then.”

“I love you.” She whispered again and her lashes fluttered like small wings against his throat.

He smoothed his hand over her back, rubbing gentle circles.  “I know.  An’ I love you, always.  Hush, now.”

Aeryn nodded against his shoulder, wrapped safe and warm, demons chased away for once and sleep dragging her under in a wave. Sighing, Sebastian tucked her head under his chin and murmuring a prayer for peaceful rest, he slept too.    

 

 


	28. Chapter 28

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _You all have been waiting a fiendishly long time for this chapter and I'm sorry for the unplanned hiatus. Life. *hands*_

The night was crisp and clear, if utterly dark with the moons left in shadow.  Good night for hunting.  Quiet...that settled, waiting quiet of a winter night.  

 

Aeryn breathed in the rich scent of pine as she watched from the perch she’d found in an old chestnut, still clinging to a few brown leaves, giving her an excellent view of the campsite where her companions slept in the spill of light from the banked fire.  

 

This was her third turn keeping watch since they’d left the prison.  

 

The first night she’d intended to give them all a break from the watch, in order to make up in some small way for all the care they’d lavished on her while she was injured.  Only a couple of hours into the first leg, though, she’d started  to flag and by the fourth she’d been forced back to bed, her residual weakness turning her feet to lead and sending her eyes drooping.  All but stumbling into their tent, she’d snuggled into Sebastian’s side with a resigned sigh and been asleep in moments.

 

Last night had been better, at least she had still been mostly awake when Fenris had relieved her.  Tonight, though, Aeryn felt her strength returned despite the long walk across the plains that led to the border of Starkhaven.  It had been an easy march, now that they’d left the Vimmarks behind them, the cold air trapped near the base of the mountains had eased and the climate had grown mild for Haring, though still fair and chilly.  They all breathed easier on lower ground and the line of sight was clearer, which suited Varric and Sebastian.

 

They’d be in reach of Cleve’s seat day after tomorrow.  It wasn’t likely that the Bann would have made the ship’s journey home by now, but they had a letter of introduction for his son and seneschal.  Aeryn supposed she could have handed over the watch knowing they’d all be safe tomorrow night, but, in fact, she’d been enjoying the moments of being alone with her thoughts.

 

Rotating her shoulder to keep it loose, Aeryn considered.  It had been months now since she’d taken advantage of quiet and solitude.  Settling against rough bark with her feet drawn up, she watched a pair of tufted ear black squirrels chase each other around the wide bole of the graybarked tree she was perched in.  This was a grandmother of a tree, encrusted with lichen and nursemaiding sprouting seedlings, in an old section of the forest.  Most of the trees that surrounded them were yet slender and young.  The few older trees bore signs of a long ago fire and a half a mile up the deer path they were following there was the crumbling foundation of an old stone farmhouse.

 

It didn’t have the feel of haunts or a thin Veil, though.  Bethany had sat quietly on a flat stone concentrating for a few minutes before shrugging.  “No more haunted than any place else in the Marches,” she’d said with assurance.  Fenris had concurred and so they’d made camp and bedded down.

 

Varric had been dragging, too tired even to chuckle over a story during supper.  It hadn’t taken much to convince them to let her take first watch for a change.  And then…the night had been quiet, deep and frosty.   Perfect.  Well, for her.  She hated to drag any of them out of their tents though.  So she’d climbed the tree for the view and the chance to put her thoughts in order.

 

A deer passed just outside the edge of the clearing, picking its way with careful feet as Aeryn watched it, in case some sneak thought to use the path and noise to hide an approach, but all was clear. She’d used that trick once or twice.  Taught by Malcolm.  

 

And where had he learned it?  She’d never thought to ask, just assumed it came of his earlier days.  Never thought to ask a lot of things, really.  Father had been good at distracting her from curious questions.  And now it was all far too late.  Too late to cry over any of it, certainly.

 

So what.  So what if he had?  If he’d bent her and shaped her to suit his need?  She was good at what she did.  She was useful.  And...as bad as it had once been, she was better.  Usually.  Just…probably should stay out of the Deep Roads, from now on.  No sense in pushing her luck.

 

They’d looked at her as if she was fragile in the past couple of days, Sebastian’s worry especially chafing over her skin like sackcloth and starting to creep in between them.  She understood...but, still.  She’d had enough.

 

Her nightmares had left her alone for the most part.  She had startled awake last night thinking she heard Mother calling her, telling her that Father had collapsed in the barn but it had been a wispy sort of dream easily brushed away as cobweb in the pantry.

 

Taking a deep breath, Aeryn popped her neck and sifted through the memories of her father’s voice, the sensation of his blood being pulled from her veins, the shock of the revelation that he’d used blood magic to bind demons.  And opened the small chest he’d taught her to build in her mind, shook out the images, the worst of the revelations.  And folded it all inside, shutting the lid with a firm thunk.    

 

Control and mental discipline.. Those were still the best legacies Malcolm Hawke ever handed down.  Tools he’d learned to help manage his magic, the nagging voices of demons.  Now she knew why his needed to be so strong, at least.  Hers needed to be strong too...if only to protect them all from the worst of what she had been.

 

Had been, Aeryn reminded herself resolutely.  She’d done what she had to, no less than Father had. Time to let it stay buried.  And when the niggle of doubt, that Sebastian might not be so accommodating rose up, she stamped on it.  

 

Dawn was creeping in when she finally took a deep breath feeling her lungs fill without a creak from healing ribs, and let the crisp air clean out the last miasma of the prison that had been clogging her throat.  Aeryn opened her eyes and didn’t even bother to stop the smile that crept across her face as Sebastian’s head poked out of the tent they were sharing and he looked around blearily.  

 

She hooked her legs over the lichen padded branch and swung down to drop to the ground in a silent backflip.  

 

He’d stretched to his feet by the time she padded to the fireside and stirred up the flame under the  kettle.  “Morning, love.  Ready for breakfast?”  She’d buried a pot of oats and dried berries in the ashes last night.  It should be more than ready by now.  

 

“Leannan...you were meant to wake one of us.”  He rubbed his eye with the heel of his palm and then narrowed his eyes at her.

 

She stretched up to kiss him on the jaw, stubble catching against her lips and she nuzzled a little, enjoying the rasp and the way his hand came up to cup her shoulder.  “No need.  It was a lovely, quiet night and you all needed a bit of sleep.”  Patting him on the hip, she stepped back to squat and push the ashes away from breakfast with the fire spade.  “I’m alright. Grab the bowls and let's eat.”

 

Letting his hand drop, Sebastian did as she asked but his occupation didn’t keep him from observing Aeryn, caught between the dawn creeping up behind them and the ruddy fire in front of her.  Perhaps a trick of the flattering rosy light, but she did look...lighter, fresher for all that she’d been awake all night.  Her ragged hair and perhaps a lingering sharpness to her features were the last traces of the trauma she’d endured.  He took the bowl she offered and dropped down to one of the logs they’d dragged up to eat.  

 

“Morning, Fenris,” she called to the elf who had joined them.

 

“Hawke.  Was I not supposed to have second watch?” He glowered at her and she sniffed.

 

“Yes, but given that you were actually snoring when I looked in, I just let you sleep.”

 

“I do not…”

 

“Loudly.”  Aeryn assured him tartly and dished up his breakfast before settling next to Sebastian to dig into her own.  It was a plain bowl and she wrinkled her nose at it before taking a bite.  The dried berries were the last of their flavorings.  Even her own stash of spices was dwindling, not to mention more important items like bandages, arrow and bolt heads to replace the ones Sebastian and Varric had lost, salt and such.  They really needed to find a town to restock.  

 

After a few dull bites, she set it aside to ask, “Did you manage to get that map made?”  They’d had a detailed map when they left the boat, but it had burned in the fight with Corypheus.  

 

Balancing his bowl on his knee, Fenris pulled the piece of parchment he’d gotten from Varric out of the pouch on his thigh and handed it to her.

 

Unrolling it across her knees, Aeryn felt Sebastian leaning over her shoulder.

 

Sebastian was taken aback.  He’d heard Aeryn ask Fenris to make the map and assumed she meant a sketch of towns and such that the elf could recall from his travels across the Free Marches during his escape from Danarius.  

 

But this?  Even rendered only in stark black ink, it was a small piece of art.  The towns were depicted with landmarks, a Chantry for Tellend,  a tavern for Cherais.  There were farmsteads marked by wells and bits of forest depicted with trees, each of the sort you might find there.  There were even elevations, a smattering of hills, a lookout point along the road. ”Fenris...this is fantastic.”

 

“It is accurate.”  He shrugged and when Aeryn caught Sebastian’s eye she did as well.  Sebastian opened his mouth to...insist or something and Fenris relented.  “Before I could write and read, I had to have some way of recalling where I had been, where Danarius might not look.  The maps proved useful.”

 

“You’ve a gift, my friend.  And a rare recall.”  But he could see Fenris fidgeting under the praise and instead asked Aeryn, “So, where are we, then?”

 

“About a morning’s march out of Tellend.  If it’s big enough for a Chantry, we can restock well enough to get us to Cleve.” Cleve’s seat was just outside of the large village that bore his family name.  It was unlikely that the bann himself had made the return journey yet, but Sebastian carried a letter of introduction for Cleve's son, who was apparently taking charge more often as his father began to retire.

 

Bethany had joined them at last and greeted them cheerfully before she took her breakfast with a wrinkled nose.  "Ugh.  I'll be glad to have something else besides oats."  

 

"Hmph.  Be grateful, little sister.  I remember mornings of fried mush."  

 

"But I like fried mush."  Bethany grinned as Aeryn shuddered.  "Especially with syrup.  Or mushrooms with bacon."

 

"You were always odd," Aeryn reminded her.

 

"That's why I'm taller, I wasn't so picky!"  It was an old familial gesture, the way Bethany tapped her spoon against her older sister’s snubbed nose.  Father and Mother had both emphasized points that way and they all had picked it up, a family joke.  Bethany fought not to freeze in recollection but Aeryn smirked up at her and she relaxed.  

 

“I’ve never considered Hawke to be a picky eater.”  Fenris had watched their good natured jibbing with interest, but curiosity got the better of him.

 

Bethany rolled her eyes.  “Yes, well you didn’t grow up with her fishing onions out of casseroles or segregating all the vegetables out of the stew so she could eat everything separately, either.”

 

“I grew out of that, thanks.” Aeryn scraped the last bite of cold porridge from her bowl, as if proving a point.  “Army cooking will do that much for you.”  

 

Sebastian took the dish from her and stacked it with his own. He stood up and poured the last of the kettle into the cooking pot and started to scrub.  

 

The cold air slid down her neck without Sebastian blocking the wind and Aeryn pushed back a shiver.  Bethany saw her and frowned.  “You’ll have to watch you don’t take a chill while your hair’s so short. I’m not very good at cures for colds.”

 

Skimming the cropped hair at the back of her skull with a hand, Aeryn nodded.  “Yeah.  You don’t happen to have a scarf I can borrow?  I don’t have much in the way of extras with me.”  Reaching out, she gathered up the rest of the dishes as she stood.

 

“I think I have something.  Let me look.”

 

Sighing, Varric heaved himself up and prodded Fenris, “C’mon, we’ll start breaking up the camp.”  

 

Aeryn propped the stack of bowls next to the pot and pulled free the towel that Sebastian had tucked into his belt.  “I’ll dry,” she offered and he handed the bowl in his hand to her.

 

They worked quietly and quickly as the tents came down.  Now and again, Aeryn nudged her hip against Sebastian’s playfully to earn a little side smile from him.  When the last dish was dry he took the towel from her and chafed her hands in his to warm them back up.  

 

His were cold, too and Aeryn tugged and tucked them under her chin.  He raised his eyebrows.  “Isn’t that uncomfortable?”   

 

“Not really.  Makes me shiver.”  She was grinning and her eyes sparkled underneath her lashes and Sebastian couldn’t help a laugh as he tipped her chin up and kissed her.  

 

“Hey, you two quit your canoodling!  Fenris says that town has a tavern and I’m damned if I’m going to go an hour longer than I have to without a decent indoor place to sit just so you two can pitch woo under a tree!”  Varric bellowed across the firepit and they pulled apart, Sebastian blushing faintly.  

 

“Canoodling?”  Bethany giggled as she unfolded the knitted scarf she’d dug out from the bottom of her pack.  

 

“A writer picks up interesting words along the way, Sunshine.  The trick is knowing when to pull them out of the mothballs.”  

 

“Apparently so.”

 

…

One of the perks of taking the rear guard was getting to watch Aeryn jog in front of him.  Sebastian had realized it long ago, when he first started fighting with her.  Today was no different.  

 

There was certainly no lag in her step as they made their way across the field to find the road Fenris had sketched out for them. The morning stretched into a clear, cold noon but the wind that had plagued them the day before was stilled.

 

In the still, crisp air noises carried and it was with a small bit of glee on Fenris’ face when his sharp ears caught the sound of steel in front of them.  

 

Aeryn caught the gleam in his eye and asked, “Is that…?”  

 

“So it seems.”

 

“Excellent.  Could do with a bit of a stretch.”  She bounced up on her toes.

 

Bethany frowned between them.  “What are you two talking about?”

 

Varric sighed as he slung Bianca down from his shoulder.  “Their second favorite past time, Sunshine.  Bandit-wrangling.”

 

Sebastian couldn’t help a chuckle at the slightly abashed look on Aeryn’s face and Varric’s much put upon tone tickled him.  

 

She wrinkled her nose at him as he caught up, knowing exactly what he was laughing at.  “We could use a fight, though...an honest one.  We’ll be getting rusty.”  They crested the hill to sight a pair of men on either side of the well-kept stone road.  Trees to the north of the road made an excellent hiding place for reinforcements.  “And isn’t that what we’re here for?  To clear out the vermin?”

 

“True.  But you could at least pretend not to enjoy it, so.” Worry nagged him again and he had to ask, “You’re sure you are ready to…” he bit off the question when her eyes went cool.  Too far.

 

“I’m fine.  Look to your arrows, archer.”  Spinning on her heel, she slipped down the hill with Fenris at her shoulder.

 

Bethany patted his arm.  “She has never taken well to being doubted, Sebastian.”

 

“I’m well aware of it.  I just...no.  She’s right.  I’m being foolish.  She wouldn’t risk a fight if she thought she wasn’t capable.  Not when it wasn’t necessary.”  He amended, watching Aeryn’s stride lengthen, adding just a touch of slink to her walk.  

 

As they approached, the idling men stood up from their lazy slouches to stand intimidatingly in the middle of the stone road.  

 

“Hawke’ll start without us if we don’t move our feet, kids.”  Varric warned and they hurried to catch up.

 

“Well now what have we here?”  There was a little purr in her voice.

 

“Public tax.” One of the fellows grunted.

 

“No one comes into this area without paying.” The older man behind him, bearing daggers and a rent piece of mail hauberk, added.  

 

“Is that so?  Maker, someone should rename this place then.  Heard tell it was the Free Marches, not a toll road.”  

 

“Laugh all you like, bint, but it’ll still cost ya to walk this road.”  The younger man insisted and Aeryn heard a faint trace of a Starkhaven accent.

 

“Think again.” Sebastian urged as he strode up.  Aeryn glanced up at him, but he was frowning at the bandit in front of them.  “Do we look to be the sort you can easily shake down?”

 

“C’mon then, show us a document.”  Conceding to Sebastian’s lead, she gave the troop one last chance.

 

“What’s that?”

 

“Papers to show your authority?  Something signed by your Bann?   A Chantry mother?  Local ratcatcher, perhaps?”  Fenris and Varric chuckled at that and Sebastian shifted behind her.  Ah, he never had liked it when she made light of the fight she was spoiling for.  Better to take her temper out on this lot than him, though.

 

The man drew a sword...well, if the warped, rusted blade he brandished could be called a sword. Aeryn cocked her head and then grinned when Varric commented,“Damn kid.  Did you pick that up in a barrow somewhere?”

 

“This is my documentation. Pay up or pay up,” he sneered, baring yellowing, but actually fairly nice teeth and Aeryn’s smile went sharp.  

 

“Oh, I think payment is fine.  I have just the exact change.”

 

Having taken advantage of the slope of the hill, Bethany used a Maker’s Fist to shove the group backwards off their feet.  

 

Aeryn dove after the younger man with a eager light on her face, not even bothering to reach for a shadow.  Sebastian retreated a little farther back to where the road rose up, forming a reasonable stand from which to shoot.   And watch, he admitted to himself.  Aeryn fought smoothly; the disconcerting glee fallen from her face and leaving only the professional.

 

Movement to the north side of the road had him calling out to Varric just opposite, who launched a volley against the three archers who had been hidden in the trees.

 

Fenris and Aeryn were working in tandem, her harrying driving the sellswords into Fenris’ arching blows.  No chance for escape that way, caught between her sharp knives and his huge blade. When two of the bandits tried to break to the side,  Bethany threw up a wall of ice spikes to block the path of the deserters.

 

The fight petered out after only a few minutes. These were not the vicious, relentless back alley dregs of Kirkwall and against the trained responses of the companions, they had little chance.   Sebastian slid the last arrow he’d drawn back into his quiver, a moment of prayer on his lips as Fenris and Aeryn began the task of looting the bodies.   

 

The haul was disappointing.  The other bandits were no better armed than the boy she’d cut down first and none of them were wearing more than a paltry ring or a cheap clay medallion.  “None of this is worth the weight of hauling.”  Fenris grimaced, casting another pitted blade to the side.

 

“They don’t seem to have been particularly well-fortuned thieves,” she agreed.

 

“Were they all from Starkhaven, do you think?”  Sebastian wondered aloud as he gathered the handful of arrows he’d shot,  and beside him, Varric shrugged as he tugged half-heartedly at the bolt embedded in a sternum.  

 

“Too late to find out. Could be that one just wandered south.  If things are as bad as rumors are claiming, we might see more like him, though. Well, shit...” he added as the bolt snapped.  

 

Finally, Aeryn found a doeskin bag tucked into a grizzled archer’s shirt, holding a goodly amount of coin stripped from other travelers.  Holding it up, she tossed it to Sebastian.  

 

“What’s this?”

 

“Spoils of war.”

 

“Ah.  And...why are you giving it to me?”

 

She frowned at him and Sebastian scrambled wondering if he’d missed one of her subtle signs, but she answered mildly enough, “If this town is considered under the protection of Cleve, then it’s ostensibly under Starkhaven’s influence.”  When he still looked a little baffled, she added, “Prince Vael.”

 

“Ah.”  He stared at the bag in his hand.

 

“We’re starting that, then?”  Varric asked.

 

“Have to start somewhere.”  But her eyes were on Sebastian and the clutch in her heart eased when he lifted his chin.  There he was.  “And along with the purse goes the lead in dealing with people.”

 

“I...dinna want to usurp your lead.”  This was one of those moments Alistair had warned him of, Sebastian realized.  Somewhere he had to step up...but...Aeryn had lost so much of her autonomy, coming with him to the Marches. In Ferelden, she had been Lady Hawke and Alistair had held her forth as a Champion.  It chafed on him to not be able to do the same.

 

“You aren’t.  I’m handing it over.”  When he started to shake his head, she scowled at him, refusing his worry.  “We’ll be dealing with town leaders and Chantry mothers.  Lesser nobles far more than bandits and ruffians.  That’s your territory.  That’s where you need to put yourself forward to get known.”  In a gentler tone, she added.  “It can’t be me, right now.  Do you want it to be Varric or Fenris?”  

 

Bethany caught Aeryn’s apologetic glance and shrugged.  She’d gotten reasonably philosophic about the limits of being a mage.  

He heard an edge of disappointment in Aeryn’s last sighed words. “No.  No...you’re right.”  Sebastian tucked the pouch into his belt.  “I’m sorry.  I don’t mean to be difficult.”

 

Reaching out, he brushed away a drop of blood that was drying on her temple.  All the more reason to turn closer to Starkhaven, to place the walls of his city between her and trouble.    

 

Fenris’ gruff voice broke in on them, in warning.  “Hawke.  It seems we’ve attracted some attention.”

 

Aeryn glanced away from the concern in Sebastian’s face to see oh, lovely.  Just what we needed.  A Templar, hurrying down the lane.  A quick sideeye at Bethany assured her that her sister was carrying the staff that was practically disguised as a piked stave, with no esoteric carvings or stones.  She’d ditched her robes for travelling gear, since leaving the Wardens’ prison, smart girl.  Aeryn pulled her hood up, taking her own precautions against recognition.  

 

“Hold, strangers!”  The Templar, clad in full skirted armor, called out from far enough away that she might have been out of range of the average archer.  Not Aeryn’s archer, of course, nor her crossbowman for that matter, she thought with a bit of smug satisfaction, but the warrior could be forgiven for her misjudgement.

 

“These bandits attacked us, Ser Templar.”  Sebastian called out without looking at Aeryn. “Would you mind coming to see if you know them?”

 

The Templar drew the broadsword strapped across her back and approached cautiously.  Close up, she was a tall, broad shouldered woman and from the dark of the helmet, her narrowed eyes scanned the group with an eye for weapons.  All but Varric, leaning somewhat casually against Bianca, had reshouldered their gear...though Aeryn noted that Sebastian hadn’t unstrung his bow.  

 

“Stand away, please.”  Sebastian nodded and they moved away from the corpses.  Fenris seemed to try to stand between the templar and Bethany, but she laid a gloved hand on his arm.  He was more like to draw attention than not, by that sort of thing. Realizing that his chivalry was misplaced, Fenris looked apologetically through his bangs and earned a small smile.

 

“What happened here?”

 

“We were attempting to come into town for the evening and ran into this lot, claiming to be toll collectors.  Ah...they aren’t are they?  We did ask for some proof of authority.”  Sebastian asked, carefully placing a certain note of abashment in his tone.  It had always worked on the Sisters (though never Elthina) when he’d set his foot wrong and ah he swallowed a grin when the Templar sheathed her blade and removed her helmet.  

 

Aeryn couldn’t help a small smile.  Charmer.

 

“No, there’s no toll on this road.  If they attacked you, you were within your right to defend yourselves.  You’re a merc group?  Got a name?”

 

“We have hired out in the past, but I’m simply on my way home with my companions, now.”  

Aeryn had her hood up, and he couldn’t see, but the weight of her eyes fell on him when he didn’t offer his name. It was an old reflex.  The Templar hadn’t had enough courtesy to introduce herself, and a privilege he’d nearly forgotten made him withhold his own.  

 

“Starkhaven, then?”  The Templar asked and Sebastian shrugged.

 

“Yes, but it’s been a year or two since I’ve been back.”

 

“We hear troubling things from Starkhaven these days.  If I’d a guess, this lot was probably from there.”  He didn’t want to draw attention with curiosity, but Sebastian itched to ask what she’d heard.  

 

“We could do with some provisions before we get back on the road.  Tellend is a market town?”

 

“Well, there are a few shops and a tavern.  Won’t be fancy but you can pick up this and that.”  Her sharp eyes scanned the group again, resting on Fenris’ outlandish markings for a moment.  The elf held her gaze and the Templar nodded and asked.  “Did they have any coin on them?”

 

“Not that we found.” Varric muttered before Sebastian could answer more truthfully.  He bit back the correction.  Aeryn didn’t like dissent in her ranks while around outsiders.  

 

“Ah, too bad that.  There were a couple of families come through earlier that had been wiped out of their travel coin.  They’re taking shelter at the Chantry for now while they decide what to do.”  

 

“Is that why you were out this way?”  Aeryn asked, in a quiet voice from where the shadows were pooling.  .

 

The Templar turned to her, “Yes, came out to see what could be done.”  With a steel booted toe, she pushed over the body of the younger bandit.  The cheap medallion that he wore slid out of his shirt and the woman gave a grunt, as if she was surprised they’d left anything of value behind.

 

“Without a backup?”  It was Fenris’ turn to question what seemed foolish.

 

Casting her hand out, she replied, “Just to scout.  Not many of us in arms at the moment.  A good number of our fellows have been drafted to investigate what happened in Kirkwall.  The townsfolk trained to fight are waiting for me in town.”

 

“You’re under Cleve’s rule here, are you not?”  Sebastian asked, curious.

 

She ran a gloved hand through the short greying brown hair, ruffling the bangs that had been neatly slicked back.  “Yes, Bann Aldric and he’s a good one,” she admitted.  

 

“But you haven’t asked for reinforcements.”

 

“We try to take care of ourselves when we can, though I think we’ll have to send for his aid now.  The town’s mayor is a fine person, but he’s lived through a quiet period and I think this outbreak of violence has shaken him some.”   With a shrug, she replaced her helmet.  “Come along, Mother Maris will want to hear about your service.”

 

They passed a small farmstead, looking just the wrong side of prosperous in the clear light of the afternoon.  There was a rickety wooden crossbeam fence and a listing barn across from a newly turned field, the soil a soft dun color.  A grey striped cat was washing her face and watching a few plump, muddy brown sheep graze contentedly from a pile of clover-laced hay from a perch on a leaning fence post.   Over the door of the small low-slung stone house, a well-trained bare vine promised roses in the spring and a curl of smoke rose from the chimney.   Aeryn forced herself to keep walking, but her eyes lingered on the sight until Bethany pressed her gloved hand into Aeryn’s.

 

“Looks familiar.”

 

“It does.” And in that house was a family, keeping to itself.  With no idea of the dangers looming just outside their little haven.   Or perhaps too well of an idea and keeping to itself for a reason.  She felt a tiny stirring; an old, equally familiar protective urge to set herself in the shadow outside their door.  They had a right to their peace.   Swallowing it back, she fished her shopping list out of her glove and murmured to Bethany.  “Would you and Fenris trade off those things we brought in and gather up supplies?”

 

Taking the list, she flicked it open and perused it.  “You don’t want me to stay with you?”

 

“We ought to keep going if we can.  If Sebastian and I run by the Chantry and you and Fenris run the errands, Varric can swing into the tavern and pick up any gossip we’ll miss and we can just get on.”  Aeryn added, “I know you might have wanted to pray, but…”

 

“No.  Not until we’re someplace we can trust.”  Bethany’s eyes were on the Templar’s back.  

 

“That was my thought.”  Aeryn leaned in to bump Bethany’s shoulder and sent the younger woman on her way as Aeryn caught up to Sebastian.

 

Tellend wasn’t a particularly picturesque town, but it was located on a crossroads between even smaller villages and so boasted a chantry, a tavern and a fine marble fountain in the midst of the square with the figure of a man at the center, water erupting from the pitcher in his his upheld hand and spurting from the book he held in the other.  Sebastian’s eyes lingered on the carved, mossy marble as the Templar left him to speak to the small group of armed townsfolk eyeing them suspiciously.

 

“Someone you know?” Aeryn asked.

 

“Yes actually,” he spoke quietly to keep the words between them.  “My thrice great-grandfather, Maecon.  He hired some exiled dwarves to run make some improvements to the Keep in Starkhaven and there was something of an uproar over the expense and the subsequent tax, so he had them build fountains in several outlying towns to appease the peasantry.”  Sebastian gave her a rueful half-smile. “Now of course, no one remembers the tax or the uprising and all they recall is the good man who brought a bit of beauty and water to the people.”   

 

“There are worse things to be remembered for.”  

 

“That is very true.”

 

The Chantry was the tallest building on the square, built of pale stone that was splashed with a layer of winter mud.  It boasted a small devotional garden; bare this time of year with only a few stately evergreens standing sentinel in stark rows.  

 

Varric followed Aeryn and Sebastian in, hanging back with her when she lingered near the door.  Sebastian opened his mouth to speak but thought better of it.  No sense in drawing attention to them.  Instead, he went to the altar with the Templar to stand before the ubiquitous statue of the Beloved before he knelt to receive the blessing from a mother in heavy winter robes.

 

Aeryn watched him from beneath her hood.  The line of his back as he went gracefully to his knees was one of her favorite things to see, a bit of a treat here in the midst of the day.  Beautiful man.  Shaking herself, she took in the layout of the sanctuary.  She’d like to have cased the building from the outside first, but that would have drawn too much curiosity, she knew.  Instead, she settled for standing by the door with Varric who was smiling at the tableau the ladies of the Chantry provided.  He’d always been fond of them, Aeryn was well aware, though she’d never known him to be devout.  

 

After his blessing and an introduction, Sebastian handed the bag to the Mother with a slight bow and under his breath Varric muttered, “This is going to be a damned long campaign, Hawke, if Charming keeps giving away the kitty.”

 

“We don’t need it, Varric.”  But her slight hesitation told him she agreed.  “He’ll figure out we have to keep some of the take, at least, to keep from being too dependent on Robard and the others.  But even if he doesn’t, my stash will keep us fed.”  She smirked at his grumbling snort.  “I don’t suppose you have any contacts here?”  

 

The dwarf shook his head.  “Not likely, unless we happen on a merchant with Guild ties.  I know a shop in Cleve that’s run by a member, though.  Looked her up before we left Denerim and sent her a note.  She’ll have a line of credit ready for you.”

 

“Right.”  Varric patted her elbow and turned to leave.  “Wait...I’ve an idea, Varric.”

 

“That...sounds ominous.”

 

“No...just a bit devious.  He’s hiding.”  She nodded to Sebastian who had followed the mother to a wornout looking dark-haired young woman resting beside a sleeping toddler.  “Now that we’re here, he’s trying to hold off committing to making his name.”

 

“And?  You can’t make him step up, Hawke.”  Varric had reassessed his poor opinion of Sebastian, once he’d finally left the Chantry, but Aeryn knew that deep down Varric still wasn’t sure of what made Sebastian tick.  

 

“He’ll step up.  He’s perfectly willing to do the work.  Admit it...making sure that money goes to the people it was stolen from is the right thing.”  The young woman had grabbed Sebastian’s hand and was clinging to it in gratitude as Mother Maris explained that he’d liberated their travelling fund.  Her archer startled, blushed, and then just as Aeryn knew he would, murmured a few words of blessing to her fingers brushing the top of her head, complimented her on the pretty child.  “Look at him.  That noblesse oblige comes naturally to him, he just needs a push on taking credit.”  

 

“And how are you going to push him?”

 

“Not me.  But you might go to the tavern and start a rumor...just a rumor, mind you...that a certain exile might be on his way home.  Those eyes run in the Vael line, he told me once.  His grandfather had them.”  She narrowed her eyes as Varric rubbed his nose.  “He wanted you along for a reason, storyteller.”

 

Varric hesitated and then nodded. “ Alright, Hawke.  I’ll do my job. Subtle, though, for now?”

 

“For now.”  Unless Sebastian came over too stubborn.

Varric turned and held the door with a gallant bow for an entering worshipper, a farm boy in town to make a delivery from the look of him.  Aeryn slid behind a bookcase and watched Sebastian for a few minutes, taking the time to consider.  

 

He hadn’t meant to step on her toes earlier, she knew.  He was just worried.  Being here in this Chantry, with it’s red wax candles and the heavier incense watching him converse with the respectable folk was a hard reminder of how much Sebastian had lost; more than she had, in fact.  If he held tightly to her...well, it was to be expected.  Not catered to, for her own comfort, but expected.  Sebastian needed to be reassured she was back square on her feet, but he didn’t need scolding for his concern.  Maybe a bit of a lover’s game.  Aeryn grinned a little to herself as she laid a plan.  

 

He turned his head, clearly looking for her, as the mother waved over the Templar that had escorted them into town.  A slender, small-framed older man had joined them as well, entering the small sanctuary from the small office to the side of the sacred flame.

With a sigh, Aeryn pushed back her hood and stepped out to join them.  She’d promised to stand by his side.  No more hiding for her, either.  

 

Sebastian caught her movement and smiled, “Here she is.  Aeryn, this is Mother Maris and Elder Haiden, the mayor of Tellend.”  He’d carefully avoided family names, so far.  She’d taken the time somewhere to wrap the scarf Bethany had found around her head to cover her shorn hair.  Just a wee bit of vanity, but the scarf suited her with it’s bright splash of red and blue against the darker armor.  

 

Dropping a shallow bow, Aeryn greeted them with reasonable politeness, “My pleasure, Your Grace. Lord Mayor.”

 

The Mother smiled and inclined her head graciously while Haiden waved his hand.  “We aren’t so formal as that here, serah.  Elder is as much of a title as I want.”  When Aeryn nodded in acknowledgement, Haiden continued, looking around curiously.  “I wanted to extend my thanks to the rest of your companions for your aid.”

 

“They’ve scattered, I’m afraid.  We’re all used to taking care of our chores as soon as we come into town. Have you had much trouble with bandits, here?”

 

Maris spoke up in a light clear voice as Haiden shook his head, “It’s happening more often, recently.  They tend to run from Ser Linda and her brethren, only to regroup and begin again.”

 

“They’ve been taken care of more finally, now, thank the Maker.”  

 

The Mother scolded Elder Haiden.  “One mustn’t thank the Maker for deaths.  Surely they were desperate souls to be driven to thievery.”  

 

“Some deviants just enjoy the thrill, Your Grace.”  Ser Linda explained, respectfully.  

 

The older woman clicked her tongue disapprovingly and smoothed the skirt of her robes over plump hips.  “Even so.  They must be prayed for and their bodies given appropriate rites.  I will send Sisters Jannis and Evelin with the carters to bring them to the fire.”  

 

“More to the point, something must be done to discourage any others who might follow.”  Sebastian spoke quietly but Aeryn recognized that touch of autocratic insistence that he occasionally brought to bear and smiled inwardly.  

 

“Quite right.  We must send a messenger to Bann Aldric, immediately.”  

 

“We would be happy to take a message.”  When Maris turned to Sebastian in surprise, he added, “We’re heading to Cleve, next.”

 

Hesitantly, the woman shook her head.  “No, I’m sorry.  You’ve been very helpful of course.  But I would feel better if the message was official.  My assistant was a scout before she joined the Chantry.  It will be a good excuse for her to stretch her legs, keep her from the temptation of restlessness.”   

 

Aeryn could hear a streak of pride in the Mother’s voice, and a private assurance that no one would interfere with a Chantry messenger.  She waited for Sebastian to try again and swallowed back disappointment when he firmed his mouth and nodded deferentially.  Sighing inwardly she considered the logistics.  Hopefully they could follow the Sister closely enough to lend protection. Maybe it was just paranoia on her part.  Maybe.

 

It was on the tip of Sebastian’s tongue to tell Mother Maris of his former position, to offer it to her as insurance of his worth. But there was the simple fact that he’d had a reputation that had stretched far, once.  And not as a humble brother.  He saw a frown flit across Aeryn’s almost stoic features.  She had expected him to offer again, it seemed.  

 

“If we can be of no more help, perhaps we should return to our journey.” He bowed to the Chantry folk and felt the movement at his side when Aeryn did the same.  He lead the way out of the building, only to draw up.

 

Just to the side, in a small alcove, a young lay sister was attending a new, smaller altar; unstained wood still golden and fresh, with a single red candle emblazoned with the Chantry sun placed in the center of a white cloth.    

 

“What is this?”

 

The girl widened her eyes in surprise.  “The altar dedicated to the memory of those lost to the madness of Kirkwall, messere. As the Divine has ordained.”

 

Aeryn stepped into the silence that Sebastian’s consternation created.  “We’ve been at sea for a time.  We hadn’t heard the new ordinance.  Is there a dedication to be made?”

 

“No...just the remembrance of what grievous harm unchecked magic can do.”  It sounded like a recitation the girl had made before.  

 

“Of course.  We can’t forget.”  Sebastian had to admire Aeryn’s solemn acknowledgement, the stoic calm as she bowed and walked away.

 

He walked quietly beside her past the brown, empty garden feeling an edge of tension between them.  They passed the stone paved circle around the fountain before he asked, “Does it bother you, that they choose to remember it that way?”

 

Jarred out of her reverie, as she’d been thinking about a small item she’d forgotten to ask Bethany to pick up, Aeryn glanced up at him.  “No, not really.  It’s not as if I hadn’t heard that same exhortation nearly every day of my life, you know.”

 

“I suppose.”  She was smiling faintly, but he tried again.  “Are you unhappy with me for handing over the coin? I’ve always done my tithe, Aeryn, if I’d means to do it.  I won’t spend yours that way, but that money belonged to those people and it needed returning.  I’d have slept poorly had I kept it for a fight.”  

 

“I know that.”  

 

He nudged her shoulder with his. “Then is it that I questioned your readiness?”

 

“I’m not mad at you, love.  I get why.  I’m just a bit tired of it, alright?”  Her hand went to smooth back her bangs reflexively and she quirked her mouth ruefully again when she encountered the scarf instead.  

 

Sebastian stopped and she turned, curious as to what he was about, to meet him.

 

He cupped her cheek and stroked his thumb along her temple.  “I understand...I didn’t mean to upset you.”

 

“It’s fine,” she reassured him.  When his expression didn’t lighten, she admitted, “ I might need a forfeit, though.”  

 

Aeryn had dropped her contralto low and Sebastian leaned in closer to hear her .  “A...forfeit?”

 

She stepped into him and backed him into the semi-darkness of a doorway, convenient to her scheme.  “Just a little one.”  Her hands ran up his chest and her fingers hooked under the dragonbone plates, skimming the cool gilt edge.

 

As Aeryn fitted herself against him, Sebastian was reminded ofher warm curves just beyond his reach under a layer of dragonhide.  They’d spent the last couple of nights quietly, his body pointed out to him with an eager rush.  He’d wanted to give her more time to recuperate and Aeryn had been so determined to take her share of the watch that she’d fallen asleep nearly as soon as she’d laid down. Now, her scent; sweat, steel and a hint of almond lingering from her last wash taunted him and he tried to lean in to pay her due and kiss her.  

 

Just as their lips were about to meet Aeryn pulled away sharply, startling him.  

 

“What’s wrong?”

 

“Someone’s coming.”  She patted his chest and ducked out of the cut, leaving him, perplexed, to follow as she fell into step besides Fenris as the elf and her sister made their way to the tavern to meet Varric.  Sebastian caught up just as they entered the building; the structure old enough that the painted stucco surface was beginning to flake away from the stone beneath.  

 

A few of the tavern’s patrons looked up and then fell to whispering when they entered the warm, ale-scented building.  A fire crackled in the broad hearth, throwing shadows in the dark interior.  Aeryn caught Varric’s eye and he gave her a wink.  He’d done his part then.  

 

They ordered from a gruff barman who narrowed his gaze at Sebastian and then gave a small shrug before placing his pint in front of him.  When Sebastian turned puzzled blue eyes towards Aeryn, she shrugged only to receive a worrying flash of hurt.  Hmm.  She’d only been playing earlier, but it seemed to have escaped Sebastian.  Taking a sip of the cider that Varric had ordered for her, Aeryn set the thought aside.  

 

She’d explain it all later and make it up to him.

  
  
  


 

  
  
  
  
  


 

  
  


 

 


	29. Chapter 29

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to faejilly, who encouraged me to keep tightening on this chapter. I've a few chapters lined up now, hopefully that's enough slack to keep us rolling with a chapter a week for a while. Thanks to all of you for your patience with my unexpected hiatus!

As Bethany and Fenris worked their way through the market stalls, they were forced to step lively, avoiding the construction of the temporary structures that heralded the coming market day and the younger folk darting in and out among the carts and half-built stands running errands and pretending to run errands so as to avoid actually having to do so.  At every pause, Bethany listened in growing surprise to discover the details Fenris seemed to know about his companions.  

 

Hawke would want this knife oil with the nearly nonexistent scent, not that one, being too pungent.  Varric would accept this beeswax polish lightly diluted with sweet oil but not the other as lavender was too astringent for Bianca.  Sebastian had been shifting the quiver on his shoulder since they left the prison and clearly needed a bit of sheepskin padding to replace the one that had been singed in the fire.  She followed along, tucking his purchases into her shopping basket, a small smile on her face at his careful shopping.

 

The tanner’s boy who sold them Sebastian’s padding told them that the merchants for the monthly market day would be coming into Tellend by tomorrow and they’d have more of a chance to unload the weaponry they’d looted.  “Just not much of a call for it, local.  The Templars get their own stuff in, usually.”

 

In the shop across the square, she hid a smile by ordering the dry goods from a bug-eyed clerk, all neck and elbows, as Fenris haggled with the woman behind the counter of the general goods shop.  

 

“That would perhaps pass as a whetstone in Orlais where men sharpen their tongues instead of their blades, but I am in need of something of better quality.”  

 

His put upon sigh was rather funny, as well. Oh dear, she mocked herself.  Get a hold of yourself.  Don’t giggle at him, you aren’t actually a schoolgirl any longer.

 

With an eyebrow raised at what Bethany was sure was something of a strangled expression, Fenris bowed to her.  “Let us go.  I will wait until the other merchants arrive.”  

 

“Oh, alright.  You know, you elf lot are usually less quibbly about a bit of sharpstone.”  The old woman grumped but she pulled out a box that clearly met Fenris’ high standards as he set to picking out one for himself and another for Aeryn, a pleased smirk curling the edge of his mouth.  Bethany stifled the pent up giggle as the clerk filled one small cloth bag with spicy tea leaves and another with sugar.  None of them had enjoyed the last two days of marching without a morning cup and there wasn’t much in the way of palatable herbage on the road they found themselves upon.

 

Back outside, in the murky half-light of the early falling evening, they took a few steps when Fenris flung an arm up to shield Bethany from a tumble. Forced to stop precariously on the edge of the wooden planking as a load of baskets was pulled haltingly across their path in an adapted handcart by a reluctant pony.   They stepped back onto the porch of the shop to avoid the splash of icy muck and in their pause, Bethany asked, “Do you think we’ll stay overnight?”

 

“It is hard to say.  I know Hawke meant to be moving again.”  He peered at the list Bethany had handed him, written in Aeryn’s neatly sloping script, familiar enough now. “However, we could use a few more supplies.”

 

“And a night’s rest.”  Bethany’s feet were aching in her boots and she wiggled her toes, regretfully.  She should have taken the cobbler’s advice and taken the thicker soles, despite the heavier tread.

 

Fenris nodded, agreeing.  They watched the basket cart maneuver into a slot near the general goods store, splashing the brick wall with a new coating of grey mud and proceeded, cautiously.  

 

There were a few  brilliantly colored scarves tied around the pole of a cart full of dried ginger and other roots and mushrooms and Bethany stopped  to finger the finely woven wool.

 

“Those’re woven by the Widow Mavis, down the road aways.  She’s got good nimble fingers, for all she’s next to blind,” the merchant, a beanpole of a fellow with fingers starting to gnarl with cold and joint-ail, said around a stalk of wheatstraw.  “I bring ‘em to town for her.”

 

“She’d like this better than my old scarf, don’t you think?”  The one Bethany had let Aeryn borrow was a treasure she’d carried from Lothering, faded now with a hundred washings.  But it was the last of her things she’d kept, from Lothering.  Aeryn would be careful, of course, but...

 

Fenris eyed the colors and tugged at the end of the darker blue with a deep red paisley pattern.  “This one, I think.”

 

“Oh, that’s lovely.”  Bethany looked at the little tag and bit her lip.  Aeryn had scolded her a couple of times in Ferelden for stinting herself.  “Buy what you want.  We’ve coin to spare.”  But, then, Aeryn almost never bought anything, either.  

 

Fenris saw her hesitate.  “I’ve a bit extra, if you haven’t enough.”

 

Making up her mind, she untied it. “No.  I’ve plenty, thanks.”

 

As she counted coppers into the merchant’s hand, Fenris watched her.  She seemed to have mostly recovered from her exertions to heal Hawke.  The color that bloomed in her cheeks as they worked was reassuring, but she had a limp beginning to show.  The boots she wore were warm, but perhaps ill fitting. Hmm.  He’d have to point it out to Hawke if the rogue didn’t see it herself.  

 

“Still, I know Sebastian wants to get to Starkhaven quickly.”  Packing the scarf and two gingerroots into her hip pouch, Bethany picked up the trail of their conversation as they picked their way across the muddy track.  She hid a smile at Fenris’ fussy step.

 

“Hmm.”  Fenris had his doubts about that, actually.  They were not proceeding on anything like a frontal assault.  “I’m not entirely sure he’s as eager as he makes out to be.  Even with the plan of a circular movement in, our first foray seems to be leading somewhere other than the city itself.  Perhaps he dreads it more than he lets on.”

“I suppose that the idea of taking up a throne could be too daunting.”  She searched the elf’s dark profile before she asked,” And you...are you looking forward to it?”

 

His eyebrows flew up, but Fenris answered willingly enough, “I am looking forward to being of aid to Hawke and Sebastian.  To return the favor of their friendship. But...then I will have to decide what to do for myself.”

 

“You don’t mean to stay?  In Starkhaven.”

 

Shrugging, Fenris tried to answer her honestly,“I do not know.  I...had not thought what to do once I was free of Danarius.  Then, events changed so quickly that I was taken by surprise before I could consider my...future.”  Bethany lips tilted at the corner when he paused.  On Hawke’s face, he thought, that tilt would be a conspiratorial smirk but Bethany’s softer features turned the expression to that of understanding.  “I came along because they wished it of me and because I wanted to help.  Once the task is done, if it is done well...I do not know. I am considering my options.” He looked just a little bewildered.  

 

“It’s rather startling having options, isn’t it?” She smiled at him winningly.  Fenris had to laugh and when the warm sound turned heads in the square he tamped down the impulse to scowl at them, to hunch his back.  He was allowed to laugh, to stand tall as Hawke and Isabela had told him time and again.  And, ah.  It had made Bethany giggle.  

 

“Indeed.”  He paused beside the fountain, the water sparkling in the sudden bright sun that had pierced the thin veil of cloud above and a warmth that was more promise than fact spread out over the bustling square .  “And yourself?”

 

She hesitated, the giggle fading under the splash of water.  Sebastian was good, kind.  Aeryn loved him, trusted him beyond all measure and Bethany had meant it when she called him a brother. But there was always going to be her magic in the background.  She couldn’t let it become a problem.  “A lot of what happens to me will depend on what Sebastian decides to do with us...my sort.  I mean...I don’t think he’ll be cruel, not at all but...  we’ve discussed the idea of a new... ”  She spun her finger around in a circle and Fenris nodded, catching her meaning.  This wasn’t the best place for a discussion.  “What he and Aeryn describe...perhaps.  It’s a whole new life, but I just...don’t know.”  Ugh...she sounded so vague. Shaking herself and drawing her shoulders up, she continued, “I know what I want to do.  I want to live quietly somewhere.  To be finished with being hunted.  To be useful.  To have a place.”  She searched his impossible eyes and finished, “Do you know what I mean?”

 

“I do.”  Her forehead wrinkled, the warm brown of her eyes dimmed and Fenris was considering how to reassure her when he caught a flash of color and the world shifted abruptly.

 

”OH!”  Bethany stumbled only to find herself hauled back upright by the waist.  She was calling up mana, half of a repel spoken before she recognized her old faded scarf wrapped cunningly around Aeryn’s head.

“Hullo, there!”  Hawke had thrown her arm around Bethany’s waist with almost her whole weight and then spun her around before linking arms with Fenris.

 

He’d seen his partner a blink before she’d fallen upon them, though not before he could rescue Bethany from the hug. “Hello, Hawke,” he sighed.

 

“Aeryn!” Bethany hissed at her. “You horrid menace!  You almost got yourself flung across the square!”

 

“Ah, nonsense, You’ve better reflexes than that!  Let’s get a drink before Varric downs the lot, shall we?”  Her eyes were fever-bright and sharp and Fenris glanced behind them to find Sebastian, with a harried expression on his face, catching up.

 

It was a familiar enough sight from times past that Fenris had to laugh again.  

  
  


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A drink or two later and a bowl of stew that was reasonably believable as rabbit as advertised, rather than rat, found Aeryn settled down next to Varric, now lovingly sharpening the quills that Bethany had laid before him like a found treasure.  Sebastian eyed her now and again, across the table as she laid the feathers straight and then at angles and then again at opposite angles until Varric set his hand across hers with a quelling sort of raised eyebrow, “Hawke.”

 

“Sorry, Varric.”   Instead she took up a cup of the sharp cider that Varric had ordered for her and from behind the rim of the cup, observed her crew.  

 

There were still signs of weariness and lingering battlescars on her companions’ faces.  Deep lines grooved on either side of Fenris’ mouth.  A tiny tremor in Bethany’s fingers as she dealt...and also a tilt in her upright figure, towards Fenris’ lean frame as if she was considering edging  against him.  Varric, pausing from his work, was flexing the fingers on his left hand as if they ached.  Sebastian’s lips, normally soft and relaxed, were thin and his elegant eyebrows were drawn as if he was suppressing a headache. At the moment, he was rubbing them and she twitched, wanting to smooth away the pain.  But guards didn’t usually give out massages and they were still playing that angle.  

 

If she was honest, Aeryn could feel the niggling sense of exhaustion numbing her own fingertips, dulling the raised pattern carved in the clay of her tumbler.  In Kirkwall, she’d been used to naps after sleepless nights.   Was there any reason to rush down the road, when they had the gratitude of the town and no sense of danger?  She drank her cup off and stacked it on top of Varric’s tumbler.  “I promised you a night off at the next tavern, didn’t I?”

 

“Two, even.” Varric nodded.

 

“Can’t do two, but for tonight will this place meet your approval?”

 

Varric leaned back in his chair, a nice glow from the barkeep’s hoppy beer on his cheeks.  “Well, the serving maids are too tall and the wicked grace table is a little slow.  But the ale is good enough.”

 

“Are we staying, then?”  Sebastian asked, startled, and she shrugged.  

 

“No reason to rush when we need the time off.  We can’t leave Cleve until we’ve met with the Bann and arranged things on his end and there’s no way he’s going to be there before week’s end even if the weather holds.  Which it won’t, this time of year.  If everyone agrees?”

 

Fenris nodded slowly.  “We would be more likely to get a decent price for the gear at the full market tomorrow and that would keep us from hauling it farther.”

 

“Beth?”

 

“It’s a little close for total comfort.  But so long as we aren’t attacked and we take a precaution or two…” Bethany reached out and tapped the lyrium on the back of Fenris’ hand, making the elf startle, his hand lifting up from the scarred wooden table.  Their eyes met a moment and when Bethany glanced back at her sister, Aeryn was nodding.

 

“Yeah, Fenris can keep what’s left of our stash.”  Having lyrium potions in a place with so many Templars probably wasn’t the best idea.  Fenris’ markings were a distraction, but not a guarantee that a sensitive person wouldn’t fish them out.  

 

“Well, then.”  Bethany nodded, “I’d like to see the market, too.  There are a few things I could use.”

 

“There wasn’t much of a selection of arrowheads at the smith.”  Fenris told their two archers.

 

“I really would prefer not to go too much further without more than a handful of arrows.”  Sebastian agreed and Aeryn spread her hands acceptingly.

 

“Then that’s settled.   Shall we arrange rooms?”

 

There was a snag, though, when Varric tried to set them up for the evening.  The innkeep shook his bald head and twitched broad shoulders starting to run to fat, apologetically. “We generally have the room, serah, but with the market…I’ve only two rooms anyway and now they’d just be for the night.”

 

“Damn…well...”

 

“Serah?  Did I hear you say you needed a place to stay?”  An elder lay sister, one of those who’d been listening on the edges while they were conferring at the Chantry, was waiting at the bar.  Aeryn had heard her ask the barman for small ale and, though he’d brought it out promptly, the older woman had lingered, throwing them glances for the last minutes.  She plucked at Sebastian’s sleeve.  “Please, Mother Maris was hoping to find a way to repay your efforts on Tellend’s behalf.  I’m sure she’d be pleased to offer you shelter for the night.”

 

Aeryn answered bluntly before he could dismiss the suggestion gently. “No thank you, Sister.”

 

“Oh, please.  We have plenty of room and travelers always have wonderful tales.”  Her eyes, creased about with years but still a bright green, were shining up at him and Sebastian couldn’t help the memory that washed over him.  It had always been a special treat to have travelers come through to share their stories of the outside world.

 

“Ah…”

 

“We can’t take rooms meant for the indigent.”  Curt, Aeryn shook her head as she swung her leg back over the bench to lean back with her elbows against the dull polish of the bar.

 

Aeryn moved, the wistful recollection drifting across Sebastian’s face sending her scrambling to tamp down the rush of jealousy that spiraled up her spine like chokevine.  He turned to her, his eyes flashing sparks and clearly about to ask her to reconsider.  Before he could though, she caught Bethany’s ducked head and the way her sister had pressed back out of the firelight.  Bitterness flooded her mouth as she coolly told him, “Of course, you are welcome to sleep where you like, Messere.  Perhaps you prefer the shelter of the Chantry’s arms over a tavern. You’ve no need of a guard there, surely, and we can have a night off.”

 

“That’s not what this is about,” he chided, a hint of anger coloring the thin skin over his cheekbones.   “It behooves us to keep good counsel with the Chantry.“

 

“We could use the information.  I agree completely.”  Aeryn flipped her hand up in a casual dismissal and glanced around the room, pressing back sullenness and forcing an aloofness that was almost beyond her for once.  You can’t possibly be jealous of a bunch of cloistered old women.  But she was.  Sodding Void, he’s allowed to have his good memories, you bitter twit.  Not to mention that Bethany was perfectly safe, here at the tavern.  

 

Sebastian felt his jaw clench, teeth scraping together in a way that was like to make his head ache later. Between her high handedness earlier and this now, he was fighting his own temper.  He bowed to the lay sister, “I am sorry, Sister.  I prefer not to divide our company.  But please, allow me to help you with your cask back to the Chantry.”

 

“Oh, you don’t have to…”

 

“I insist.”  He didn’t glance back as he hefted the small barrel and followed the woman outside as she fluttered, holding the door for him as he stalked into the slap of the damp, frigid night.

 

 0000000  

   

Back at the bar, Fenris was shaking his head.  “You are a brat, Hawke.”  He said it in a low tone and glancing at the tavern door with concern.

 

It took a tick to drag her eyes from the door that had closed behind him.  “He knew it when he took me on, too.” She waved the barmaid over for a refill. The tall, slender woman gave her a wink and Aeryn redirected shock into an answering smirk that crawled across her lips.

 

“Aeryn…”  Bethany looked worried.

 

“I don’t want to hear it.  It was a bad idea, all round.” stupid, stupid thing to say.  Bloody Void you stupid...she forced her eyes to look towards Bethany, trying to shake off the clutch of ice in her chest.

 

“He’s going to come back angry and you’ll deserve it.”  Bethany’s worry had turned to to a bite, seeing Aeryn’s blank face and the scrawl of a halfsmile telling lies.  “He was only being polite.”

 

Varric finished off the pint he’d ordered with his last whiskey.  “If he comes back.  Chant’s about to start.”  

 

Aeryn cut a look at him, but there wasn’t any sympathy for her in the dwarf’s turned shoulder and now Fenris was sharing a look with her sister.  If she spent the night alone her companions would think it a fine thing, clearly.  of all the things to cut up over you deserve what you get  Turning away from them, she cast her eyes over the warmly lit, crowded dining room, instead.  

 

Payday, just before the market, clearly and the noise was jocular and the ripening smell of warm bodies and ale filled the room.  A fairly talented bard piped in the corner, a lilting tune under the hum of conversation.  Two young women, seamstresses if Aeryn judged the premature fine lines around their eyes and the unusually fine stitching of their own dresses,  were finishing a shared supper, the edges of one purse poking out from the pockets of an apron thrown casually across the back of the chair.  A handful of men were leaning against the bar...all of them had casually stuffed change into pockets with seams easily split.  One had taken off a ring when he’d come in, and wrapped it in a handkerchief to slip in the loose top of his boot..  

 

His florid complexion likely just meant his hands were swelling in the warm room after a day at work in the cold.  Still, he’d be in trouble if he lost it.  She was almost inclined to see how much.  

 

Isabela would have laughed at Aeryn sniping at Sebastian, that darkly amused rich chuckle and then pointed out that purse on a too slim string on the tanner’s fine belt with an eyebrow raised in a dare and  suddenly Aeryn felt more alone than she’d been in years.  

 

Coin flashed as one farmer lad with a shock of ginger hair bought a drink for the bard, happily playing her pipes over the dull roar of the patrons.  She flashed a promising, crooked toothed grin at him, making him blush.  

 

Maker, this was a lush pick.  

 

Aeryn’s fingers itched and she flexed them in her pocket to close around the cool carved disk she’d carried like a talisman the last weeks. Only to tense, guiltily, when the barman leaned over the planks with his pitcher and frowned at her.  

 

“Didn’t mean to cause troubles with your boss, serah.”

 

“It wasn’t you causing the trouble.”  She pulled the earring out and ran it over the back of her fingers.  “I ought to keep a better rein on my tongue, is all. Cost me a job or two, before.”  

 

“Well, no, I guess I can’t claim the blame but I might can fix it.  My other maid is gone for a day or two, with her sister for a laying in.  You’re welcome to her room, if you don’t mind it being on the smallish side.”

 

“You don’t have to…”

 

“Not out of the kindness of my heart, now mind.  I’ll charge the going rate. Judging by that armor, and the drink you’ve slung, you all aren’t looking for charity.”

 

She hesitated before ducking her head, “Alright.  Thanks.  She stacked another four silvers for him to sweep away.

 

“Finnegin of Finnegin’s Fine Tavern and Traveller’s Rest, at your service.”  

 

Aeryn dropped a slight curtsy and spun up her roguish smile, “Aeryn.”  She pointed the rest out, “M’sister Beth. Our fellows at arms, Fen and Varric.”  It had been a long time since she’d casually given out her given name, but Finnegin would remember if she didn’t give him something and they were still too close to Kirkwall for either Amell or Hawke.  On her own, she’d have used an alias...but they were too many to force them all to recall it.  

 

“Nice to meet you.  The two standard rooms are to the left at the top of the stairs.  And Bitsy’s room is over the kitchen, just go all the way down the hall and bear right.  It’s small but she’s neat.”

 

Varric toasted the barkeep.  “Our thanks for the extra room.”

 

“Well, have to do our part.  Them bandits were bad for business, anyway.  This is the best crowd I’ve had in weeks.”  Polishing up the smeary wax on his bartop with his glass cloth, he grinned at her and then cast his eye over her friends.  “Nice additions to the scenery, too.  Even that nobleman of yours...something about him’s familiar.  Like...he’s a face I’ve seen before.”  

 

“He has family around here, so I’m told.”  

 

Varric was about to launch another rumor when a peal of music rang out.  The bells from the Chantry were muffled in the damp air, but Aeryn was grateful to the sound that reverberated even in the jolly noise of the tavern.  Varric was right, Sebastian would stay.  Hopefully it would soften his anger-hurt-at her sniping.  Not only that, it seemed to have jarred Finnegin from his reverie and saved her from any more definite statement.

 

The barman stood up and, with a deep wheezy breath, called out,  “There’s the bells, folks!  Them of you going to Chant better head out.  Don’t want the Sisters to tithe me so hard for late hours that I can’t buy the good stuff!  Janie!  Where d’you think you’re goin’?”  

 

The tall, slender barmaid waved her hand as she hooked her arm through a burly smith’s elbow, the brown homespun apron already on a hook by the door.  

 

“Blighted flirt.  Can’t ever count on her past the bells.”  Finegan gave an exasperated smile at the swinging door and  sighed as he gathered up the tumblers his customers stacked on the bar as they left.

 

“Mervyn was making stout pie for m’supper, too.”  He grumbled as he carried another stack of earthenware to the back.  “I’m tempted to leave this lot for after.”

 

When he came back for the last, Aeryn made her offer.  “Do it.  I can close up the front, if you like.”  When he raised bushy, grey eyebrows at her she shrugged.  “Got to wait up for the boss, anyway.”

 

“I’ll take it.  Y’ve never had anything like that man’s hot water crust wrapped around a nice bit o’ steak. And he gets a bit pissy if I leave it cold.”

 

She grinned at him and he was laughing as he hauled up the last tray of barware in beefy, hairy arms to stash in the kitchen.  

 

Fenris cleared his throat behind her and she cocked a brow at him.  “Yeah?”

 

“You’ve taken a job as a serving girl?”

 

“No.  I’ve found myself something to do while I wait up for Sebastian.”  She drew a pattern in the wax with a broken thumbnail and smoothed it away.

 

“Y’know, Hawke, you used to cover your tells better.  Bad news for a thief to get sloppy.”  Varric swept up the cards and his quills.  “Come on, Sunshine, grab the bottle and the cups and let’s get settled in.”  The bar had cleared out and he asked, “You mind heating up some water?  That washroom is colder than I really prefer to subject my delicate sensibilities to.”

 

Bethany smiled at him, “No, Varric.  I’m happy to indulge you.”

 

The rogue heaved a sigh and executed a nice bow, “M’lady, you are a lifesaver.  I can just about smell my own hide.”  Just before he went up, he added, “Don’t stay up too late.  He’ll be back.”

 

Aeryn nodded and Varric snorted.  She was far gone if she didn’t tease him for being a hen.

 

When Aeryn handed her the last cup, Bethany added, “If you’ll call me, I’ll come do yours too, when you’re ready.”  

 

“Thanks, sis.” Aeryn was surprised when, in a small awkward rush, Bethany brushed her cheek with a kiss.   

 

“You do not want to come play cards with us?”  Fenris asked as they watched her climb the stairs with quick steps behind Varric.

 

“Not particularly.”  His lips turned down in that minimalist twitch that spoke of hurt and she sighed.  “I messed up, Fenris.”

 

Fenris paused before he answered, watching regret flicker across her face.  “I see no reason to argue with that.”  

 

“I don’t want more lecturing than I have to have for acting as though I’m a petulant five year old and I’d really rather not get it with an audience, if there’s yelling.  There’ll probably be yelling.”  At her wan half smile, Fenris leaned into her shoulder.

 

“He’s forgiven you before.”

 

Aeryn was quiet with her head cocked, listening to footsteps fade outside.  “He shouldn’t have to.  This isn’t...it’s been a long time since I didn’t owe him some confidence in who he chose to trust.” She leaned her head on his shoulder and his strong arm slipped around her in a brief squeeze. “Don’t stay up too late, yeah?  We all need the rest.”  She breathed in the familiar scent of him all spice and leather and just the faintest sharp hint of lyrium reminding her, “Hey, did you and Beth have a good chat?  It was nice to hear you laughing like that.”  

 

“We did, yes.   She’s a sensible sort.  Hard to believe the two of you are sisters, at times.”  He chuckled at her sniff before adding, “She is worried about what she will do, later.”

 

“I imagine she isn’t the only one.”  Fenris gave her an agreeing sort of nod and she crooked him a bare half of a smile.  “We’ve got time to find our places.  With any luck...well, we’ve already seen that we’re needed here, right?  If the bandits were just a foretaste, we’ll be kept busy enough.”  

 

“Fairly likely.  Something to look forward to, then.”

  
He grinned slyly and Aeryn had to laugh a little, swallowing her dread of what the rest of the evening might bring.  Maybe Finnegin wouldn’t begrudge her a bottle.                               

  



	30. Chapter 30

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to faejilly for her read-through!

Sebastian’s anger didn’t cool, even with the frigid slap of damp air that met them outside the warmth and noise of the tavern, until he noticed the sister giving him slightly frightened glances and stepping quicker than she might have, normally.   _Maker…was he so forbidding when he was upset, these days?_  Settling the cask in his arms, Sebastian relaxed his jaw, trying to gentle his expression.  “We should be slower.  It wouldn’t do to jostle the ale, Sister...”

 

“Odette.” She bobbed her head nervously.  “I did not mean to cause you trouble.”

 

“It was not your fault.  I did not expect that your offer would be taken so amiss by my…companion.”

“Well, if she wasn’t too careful, she wouldn’t be much of a guard, I suppose.”  Before Sebastian could correct her misunderstanding, Sister Odette was pleading again, “ _Won’t_ you stay?  There’s always more than enough at table and we have a lovely guest house.  You can look after Chant.”

 

“No, Sister.  I have my friends to get back to.  We have a journey to continue early, if we can manage.”

 

With a sigh, the woman bobbed another curtsey.  A holdover from a former life, Sebastian thought.  Most sisters were less obeisant to those outside the hierarchy.  

 

“Thank you, then, messere.  May the Maker hold you in His Light.” Her hand was raised, fingers curved in blessing’s graceful form.

 

He bowed in return, “Maker’s Blessing to you and your Sisters and upon the walls of this Chantry.” Behind them, the melodious bells rang out the call to Chant.  The cords in his throat tightened as if he was readying to sing; fifteen years of training, of ritual, of comfort and a sense of _home_ not so easy to set aside, especially with the memory of Aeryn’s cool dismissal and the way she’d pulled away from him, tonight.  

 

He was _weary_ of having to scry the bones of her discontent and read between her lines.  A break was due him, perhaps.

Catching back the edge of the kitchen door he’d started to let swing shut, Sebastian spoke.  “Wait.  I think an’ I _will_ come to Chant.  I have missed the singing too often, of late.”

 

Odette’s smile was beautiful and honest in her plain face, backlit by the warm bustle of the kitchen.  “Oh, wonderful!”

 

There was no sermon at this late service, only the Joined Chanting of Benedictions but it was nonetheless convivial and almost crowded with the seven sisters and Mother Maris, several late workers, a few older folk, and a couple from the tavern cooing the lines of Chant inappropriately at one another in the corner.  Sebastian was almost tempted to call them out before recalling that it wasn’t his duty, any longer.  In the warm atmosphere, he managed to relax.  A happy change from the discord of the Denerim Chantry or even the sparsely attended palace chapel.  

 

He knelt, unease flowing out of his bones as he breathed deeply during the brief, silent meditation before the Sacred Flames.  He forced her out of his mind and sought the quiet center that he had neglected of late, until the cantor took up the Chant again in signal to the devout that they were dismissed.  

 

Surrounded by the chatter of happy worshippers in a waft of incense heavy air, Sebastian stepped back into a night turning crisp as the damp settled.  With the brush of a breeze, icy and faint, and the flicker of pale starlight, the night brought her back to him.

 

Slowly, he strode across the hushed square lit only by a few windows casting their homely light out on the stone paths, pausing for a moment by the fountain and letting the last of the faithful pass him by to their homes.

 

Ice was forming along his ancestor’s edges and he brushed a few frozen droplets from the arrogant marble face before he turned to go.  It was a long time since he could recall being alone at night.  Kirkwall.  And then...it had been dangerous to linger.  He shook his head over his foolish dallying.  Aeryn would be worrying and it wasn’t truly his intent to worry her.

 

A few more steps had him on the wide planked porch.  The tavern was dark, the downstairs windows shuttered and only the distant nicker of a horse in the barn met him as he scraped the mud from his boots on the upturned iron edge placed near the door.

 

Hitching his breath, the dull ache returned in the pit of his stomach and the cinch of a headache behind his eyes, Sebastian almost expected the door latch to be locked for the night.  Maybe he hadn’t been missed after all?

 

But there was a figure moving around inside, just barely visible through the amber-tinted wavy glass of the door and the latch lifted easily when, after his hand hovered a moment, he brought up the nerve to try it.

 

With her back to him and the bar lit only by the remnant of the fire in the massive fireplace, waiting to be banked, Aeryn was deftly drawing a broom across the hearth on the other side of the gloomy, eerily silent barroom.

 

Sometime since he’d left, she’d discarded the scarf covering her shorn hair and changed from the leathers she’d been wearing to her green wool tunic, cleaner...somewhat... than the gear she’d been wearing, tugged out over her trousers.  On the dull wooden bar stood a nearly empty brown bottle, a gold disk leaned against it, and a glass turned mouth down on the plank, a drop or two of liquor puddling beneath it.

 

From across the room, he watched the pale, vulnerable nape of Aeryn’s neck, the graceful sway of her neat figure for a space of minutes.  The broomstraw shushed across the worn brick hearth and she worked steadily, with her head down as if absorbed by the mindless task.  What would life have been like, he wondered, had she been a barmaid he’d come across.  If the vulnerability hadn’t been a deception.  If he’d never taken vows.

 

Finally, he cleared his throat.  “Did you have to earn our keep, then?”

 

The door swinging open had startled her out of her reverie, out of the recriminations snarling into tangles across her thoughts.  As Sebastian’s long silence had grown, coming close to unnerving her, Aeryn fell back on an old habit.  “Offered to lock up.  Got bored.”

 

It had been a long time since she’d pulled that casual, nonchalant voice out for him.  It belonged to the past, not what they were now, not between lovers, between _anam charaid_ and he snapped back at her, hurt. “I’m so _sorry_ , Hawke.  I did not realize I was keeping you from something more interesting.”  As if he’d been dallying with some other and he pushed back the false guilt trying to whisper to him that it wasn’t a poor comparison.  He’d not likely have stayed to the singing if they’d not bickered, before.

 

Aeryn winced before she turned around and said levelly, not giving into the goad of his temper.  He had a right to be angry at her.  “I didn’t mean that.  I figured you’d stay for Chant and I just thought I’d be useful as the tavern apparently closes once tenth bell rings.  Finnegin’s short a maid, so I told him I’d lock up.”

 

He was glowering at her, looking down that fine nose with all manner of disdain.  It was unfair of him, really, to be so...glorious when he was angry.  Perhaps it was bred in the bones of princes, to keep their subjects allured when they were quaking in their boots.

 

Not that she was quaking.  Or wearing boots, for that matter.   _Focus, Aeryn. Third glass was a mistake._

 

“You're angry.”  

 

He snorted.

 

“I'm sorry.”  She was hoping that the simplicity would gain her some approval, her eyes searching the austere planes of his face for some sign of forgiveness.

 

But he clearly wasn’t ready to give it. “Well, and you should be.”

 

With his arms folded across his chest, fists knotted, his whole body closed off to her and Aeryn forced herself to be still and not fold in reaction, herself.  She’d brought it on herself with a sharp tongue.  Even Sebastian, understanding as he tried to be, had his limit.  

 

She was an adult.  She could take it.

 

Moving the broom behind her back, Aeryn clasped her fingers around the work-smoothed handle to hide the tremble in her fingertips. “I am.”

 

“For all your dislike of the Chantry, I’ve never known you to be cruel about it to the sisters.  She’s a simple woman offering the only hospitality she can.  It was badly done of you.”

 

“So I’ve been told.  Fenris, Bethany, even the _barman_ saw fit to chastise me, wicked creature that I am. I chose penance.” The mild jape slipped her reins and she groaned inwardly and tried to disarm with a smile.

 

The wry quirk of her lips tightened the lines around his eyes. “It is not a joke.”

 

Sebastian watched as Aeryn’s eyes skittered to the side at the clipped sound of his disapproval and shadows bent around her feet as she retreated from him.  Frowning, he offered, “When you've acted like that, it’s something that's frightened you. But for the life of me I canna figure out what …”

 

“ _That_ frightens me.” Maker, she hated the impulse to just blurt out every little truth that burst forth around him. _No way out now but through_.   “You never hesitate.  You walk through those doors and breathe the smoke and everything you've learned in eight years with me flies out of your head.  You just _trust_ them.”

 

The words of Benedictions were still on the edge of his tongue, the scent of incense still in his nostrils.  “I was them.”

 

When Aeryn glanced back at him her eyes were opaque and her face was completely smooth and the contrast with the moment before struck him like a fist to his heart.   But it was a momentary lapse; a blink and she was soft again as if she was forcing herself to stay open to him and the last frigid knot of anger, the one that had been lodged in his gut making it hard to stand straight, thawed and drained with the knowledge.  

 

“Yeah. You’re right...I was rude.  I'll apologize, given the chance and claim some lingering injury for my ill managed tongue.  I don't want them remembering your ungrateful companion, later, when they realize who you were.  Are.”  She turned away again before she saw the way the anger had bled out of him, leaving him to sag against the doorframe.

 

“Aeryn…”  

 

She tried again, the broom swishing a small arc in the stubborn dusting of soot clinging to the bricks.  Finnegin had been using too much soft wood in his fires.  “You were outside a while.”

 

Sebastian fought to keep his feet still on the fresh rushes beneath him as he admitted, “I thought it might be locked and I didna want to find out.”  

 

Shocked, she jerked around, tearing her gaze from where she’d been staring at her fingers clutched around the broom she’d been using to sweep the hearth clean.  “Locked?  Why would you think you’d be locked out?”

 

He nodded to his pack and bow, lone on the floor next the table where he’d sat them next to hers, now gone.  “I saw my things still here.”  The whine in his voice made him bite his cheek and shake his head. “No reason, I suppose.”

 

Aeryn watched him warily, the way his arms were folded now and his focus somewhere above her head.  “No, if you thought that, there was a reason.   You aren’t prone…unlike certain others of your acquaintance….to flying off the handle.” _Enough.  Enough of this._ She set the broom against the wall and, pulling up courage she didn’t feel, padded across the floor until she was in reach of him.   “Sebastian?  Why?”

 

Sebastian flicked his eyes away from her face, so open and concerned.  “I was…it was nothing.”

 

Aeryn shivered as if a damp draft had forced its way down the chimney across the back of her neck.  His eyes were still averted-so unlike his normal direct gaze, his unfailingly honest self- that the wrongness of the moment curled like a frost spell down her spine.  As if she could dispel it with a touch, she reached out tentatively, her fingers barely brushing his leather sleeve, as shy a caress as she’d ever laid upon him, and looked up.  

 

This close, he could see the chapped edges and broken skin of her bitten lip.  She’d been worried. He batted aside the urge to brush his thumb there.  

 

“You’ve asked that of me before…not to lock you out.”  At Vigil’s Keep, he’d ordered it angrily, slamming his hand on the door and with a bark in his tone and she’d dismissed it as the lingering spark of their argument.  Twice now, though…and a dozen more in less direct ways?   No, that meant something that needed her attention.

 

“Have I, then?”  His hand twitched up, the urge to rub the back of his neck biting, but he deflected to his shoulder instead, not wanting to give her the tell. Let her read _him_ , for once.  

 

Aeryn frowned.  That was the shoulder he’d injured fighting Corypheus.   Laying her palm on his lean, cold reddened cheek, she gently pressed to redirect his eyes down to hers.  After a moment of searching the chilly blue, she spoke, “I was waiting down here for you to apologize to you.  I was purposely rude and it might have reflected badly on you.  I have more control than that.  It won’t happen again.”  Her other hand framed his face.   “And there aren’t any locks between us.”   _That’s part of the problem, sometimes._

 

Her palms were warm and suede soft against the rasp of his unshaven skin and he tensed to keep himself from nuzzling.  He shut his eyes against the worried plea in hers.  

 

“I’m _sorry_.  Please forgive me, Sebastian. I was...” No, she wouldn’t try to make excuses.  She wasn’t a child any longer, wasn’t vulnerable, and she had promised him to try harder. Her fingers stroked his cheek for a moment longer before, snagging her lip in her teeth, and swallowing a hiss when she hit raw skin, Aeryn pulled back, letting her touch drop away start as her off hand snaked around her midriff.  Sucking in an unsteady breath to let her make her next statement, as she turned away.  “The others took their things up.  Do... you want yours to take back with you?”  

 

Sebastian clenched the hand he’d started to raise, too slowly, as she turned from him.  Aeryn’s careful, charted, movement away reminded him of not so long ago days when she’d given him every chance to keep his distance.  “No.  I’ll be staying with you, just like I’d hoped you’d have stayed with me.  But y’give me no credit, Aeryn.  I know well enough we cannot board at the Chantry.”

 

“We wouldn’t have been together at the Chantry,” she scoffed.

 

Consternation flooded him and he stood straight back up.  “Yes, we would have.”   _Wait, was that the trouble_? ”Aeryn, the rooms for visitors are not...they aren’t segregated.  We’d have been together.”

 

She blinked at him.  “Oh.” _Even more foolish than she thought.  Stupid girl_.  

 

“You surely didn’t think I’d make you stay there by yourself, with no one at your back?”  He asked her, incredulous.  

 

With a twitch of her shoulder, Aeryn confirmed it.  “I’ve never stayed in a Chantry, how would I know?  There are cells for the Chantryfolk and...I never explored very far, you know.”  

 

“I wouldn’t have left you alone.”  He raised his hand and she flinched away again.

 

The expression on his face trod dangerously close to pity and she growled preferring to keep the fight going than suffer _that_ particular indignity.  “How was I supposed to know that?”

 

Quick, calling on his own reflexes, he caught her hand with its tattooed band, to remind her. “You’ve a right to assume I would not let us be separated!”  

 

Jerking her fingers from his grasp, “I couldn’t have stayed with you, either way!  I’m your _guard_ at the moment...or at least I was before we started this spat in public business.  It’s going to be rather a hard sell now.” She’d seen eyes on them earlier, remnants of the rumors she’d asked Varric to start and then more than likely fed by the brief argument.    Well, she’d wanted to generate a little gossip.  Good show.  

 

“You are not my...I dinna want to _do_ this anymore.”  He turned to lock the door on the darkened square, lit only by the wavering light of a few torches and the glimmer through a few windows over shops, he was only musing aloud. No more of these charades.  Once they got to Cleve that had to be the end of it.  

 

Aeryn felt the bottom drop out of her stomach.  He didn’t mean _them_.  He didn’t.  He loved her and she _believed_ him.  This was a fight.  It was serious, she’d been needlessly harsh but it was only something they needed to work past. It took her a few tries, though, to suck enough air in before she could speak and when she did, looking at the broad tense line of his back, the question flew from her before she could grab it back.  “What do you mean?”

 

He jerked around, his hands flying wide and Sebastian failed, for once, to read the blankness in her tone.  “What in the Maker’s name d’ya think I mean? I dinna want to _hide_ anymore.  I want to use our names.  I’m not _ashamed_ of you.  I...if the Chantry means you harm, if there’s a bounty and a price to pay...better to find out now than later.”

 

“Sodding black _Void_ ,” Aeryn whispered before she spun on her heel and flung herself into his arms, slamming the breath from his lungs as his shoulders hit the wood behind him.  

 

The tremor in Aeryn’s limbs had nothing to do with the dropping temperature in the large room as the fire burned to useless embers, nor the dark folding around them.  As the shaking threatened to travel to her legs, her fingers closed around a fold in his leather jerkin, trying to hold herself steady. She’d wanted to make him step fully up.  She _might_ have requested that he not yank her heart from her sodding chest in the process.  But no of course, that wasn’t his doing, it hadn’t even crossed his mind, just her own.

 

He could feel her heart hammering even through his armor, pressing against him as if she was trying to bury herself in his chest.  “Aeryn... _leannan_...what…?”  They’d been arguing and now she was shaking in his arms and he groped for words, running back over their conversation in his mind as he rubbed circles on her shivering back and tried to recover from her sudden collapse.  When her hands tightened on the sides of his leathers, he hummed low and shifted, so that she wasn’t pressed so hard against the unforgiving plate of his armor.  

 

They stood for a moment, caught between the fading firelight and the harsh shadows of the edges of the room before Sebastian shifted his shoulders against the door, slowly.  “Talk to me _._ ”

 

She was almost embarrassed at the relief of the gentleness and warmth ekeing back into his voice.She murmured, “I am sorry.  I’ll...be better if you can forgive me for being a brat.”

 

_Better?_ His mind whirled at the implications of that small word and the faint scent of strong spirit, suddenly realizing that the bottle on the bar had likely been full when she started.  “There’s nothing _wrong_ with you but an overabundance of suspicion, earned or no’. And...it’s not a question of forgiveness.  I _was_ angry, but I did not mean.”  He tipped her face up and smoothed away a nasty red crease where delicate skin had found the edge of his chestplate.  “Aeryn, we must talk about this.”

 

“I was stupid, is all.  I just...I don’t want to fight with you. I...was waiting to apologize. I’m just tired and it was a stupid thing to pick a fight over and...please can we just go upstairs?”

 

“I…”  His head was aching.  His shoulder hurt.   And, when he’d sworn to himself he’d never see those shadows under her eyes again, there they were above cheeks holding the pallor that shouldn’t be there either, not after a solid fight and a few days of marching in sharp weather that should have seen her rosy-cheeked.  “All right.”  

 

“Yeah?”  

 

If he hadn’t been sure of his welcome before the fragile way her eyes lightened, the brows easing up cleared it up.  “Yes, _mo chridhe_.”  He held his hand out.  “I couldn’t deny you if I tried.”

 

“Oh, you could I think.  But, please don’t.”  She tucked her hand in his giving him a small smile when his fingers curled around hers.

 

As they passed the bar, Aeryn palmed the coin sitting beside the bottle...no, he caught the relief on it just before her hand swept it away.  Isabela’s earring.   _Why would she have that out, now?_ He hadn’t seen it before, hadn’t realized she’d kept it with the gear they took with them off the boat.

 

The pop of an ember reminded Aeryn of her earlier promise and she pulled up by the fireplace as they passed.  “Let me finish this last thing.”  Her fingers slipped from him but he plucked the earring from her hand when she started to tuck it into her breastband and she startled, surprised at his quickness.  

 

“What’s this, then?” The gold glimmered in his hand as he rolled it over.  It was well polished, as if Aeryn had been lavishing attention upon the bit of gaud.  

 

“It was in my pocket.  I was just keeping my fingers limber.”  She’d turned away from him and crouched to shovel the coals in a neat line.

 

“You’re missing her?”  The dimming light limned out her features, blurring the lines of her face, but he could see the little wrinkle on her forehead deepen with shadow.  

 

Aeryn fussed with the ash, trying to spread it evenly.  Finnegin would come back to an icebox, if she couldn’t get it to... _ah, there_.  “I’m allowed.  She was my friend.”   

 

_Oh_.  “She’s still your friend, _leannan_.  She won’t forget.”  

 

_Maker’s Balls, and now I’m feeling sorry for myself_. _Didn’t realize I was_ that _sodding drunk_.   The breath she drew tasted of lye and soot.  “Sure, I know.”  

 

With a final little frown, the ash seemed to meet Aeryn’s approval and she dusted her knees off as she stood lithely up from where she’d sat down on her heels.  “C’mon.”

 

He followed her up the stairs and hesitated when she paused outside one of the doors leading off the narrow hallway, lit only by a candle at the back, sitting in a bowl of water on a small carved wooden table.  

 

A raucous, familiar laugh came through the wood and a lighter laugh with an answering low, smirking chuckle that followed.  Aeryn raised her hand to rap on the smooth wood and then lifted the latch to stick her head in the candle-bright room.  “G’d night.”

 

“All’s well, one assumes?” Fenris asked, concern laced in his warm voice.

 

“Yes, Fenris.  Thanks.”

 

“Hey, Charming!”  Varric called out.  “Come in here and explain to Sunshine why you wouldn’t hold a rack of Martyrs when your Seekers are set to run.”  

 

With his hand over her head, Sebastian pressed the door open wider, startled but pleased, “Well, it depends I suppose on if she’d turned up Queen’s Mace or no’.”  

 

“Show him your hand.”

 

“I don’t even see how you knew I had Seekers or Martyrs or spotted Mabari, for that matter, without cheating.”  Bethany fanned her cards out so that Sebastian could see what she held and he stepped over the threshold to look closer.

 

“Well, these cards were made in Navarre not Ferelden, so it wasn’t likely to be hounds.  Gotta count as you play, otherwise you’re always going to be fumbling in the dark.  Like broody over there.”

 

“I do fine in the dark, dwarf, never fear.”  Fenris muttered as Sebastian told Bethany, whose cheeks had pinked.

 

“Never let them see you count, though, or you’ll find your playing venues limited.”  Sebastian sat down in the wooden highbacked chair that Varric kicked out for him and leaned over Bethany’s shoulder.  

 

“We’re staying then, I guess.”  Aeryn murmured under her breath as Sebastian tugged out a card then another and pointed out their values as ballast to her sister’s game.  With a half swallowed sigh, she sat heavily beside Fenris who was eyeing the two over his own hand.  Not taking his eyes off the rack Bethany was laying out, Sebastian reached out and dragged her chair closer to his side, the wood scraping the floor gratingly.  

 

Under the table, his long fingers callused and warm, closed over hers, thumb strumming across her knuckles, gently.  Aeryn felt her nerves settle at the caress and, despite herself, the tension still sparking behind her eyes and threatening a headache fluttered to a soft buzz.  She chuckled and when Bethany leaned back with raised eyebrows to catch her eye, she shrugged and leaned into Sebastian’s shoulder to watch the tutorial unfold.  She would never understand it, how he eased her with a touch.  Did it matter, really?  He made her feel better...whatever he did, however he did it.  

 

Fighting it...and Aeryn knew she had been... fighting against the comfort he offered, the simplicity of the way loved her, pressing herself away from the way he offered it to her like it was her due.

 

Waiting for his honesty to turn into a lie.  

 

It was making her crazy, wearing her thin in the places she desperately needed to thicken her skin before they made it to Starkhaven, when more than a war would meet them.

 

She had to stop, now, before it started to erode the bond between them. They would need it, come the battle.

 

Sebastian brushed his thumb across her ring finger sending a shooting vine of warmth up her arm, even as he gathered up cards in his off hand.  He’d done it often, as if the fact she wore the little arrow proved to him all the things she’d promised.  

 

As impulsive as he’d run in Kirkwall, as often as his temper had run away with him, he was outgrowing it, at last.  And she had no right to treat him otherwise.  

 

Her eyes drooped a little, adrenaline from earlier draining and leaving her flat.

 

Sebastian glanced at her and caught the way Aeryn blinked wide, forcing herself awake.  He handed the cards back to Bethany.  “Perhaps we can have our lessons another night?”  

 

“I don’t need lessons.  I need these two to let me play my hand!”  Bethany flipped over a Mace with a flourish of long fingers and a satisfied curl on her lips.  “And too, to recall that I’ve played with Isabela once or twice since I was nineteen,” she whispered to Sebastian as Varric and Fenris grumbled, gathering the small pot towards herself with that smug cat smile that had suddenly made Fenris’ eyebrows climb and his eyes sharpen.

 

“Are we going?”  Aeryn let him pull out her chair and stand, and when Sebastian nudged her shoulder she glanced up at the table and their finished hand.  “Ah.  Alright.”

 

Aeryn let him steer her into the door across the hall that she pointed out and as she closed the door behind them she noted Fenris escorting Bethany down the hallway.  Curiosity perked through her and Aeryn ruthlessly mashed it down.  Grown folk, those two.  Though Maker help them if they threw off the balance of her crew with lover’s games.

 

_That’s my job, after all._  Through the narrowing crack in the door, Aeryn saw Fenris step over Bethany’s threshold only to halt and then turn back.  He’d only been checking it out for her, as she had taken the small maid’s quarters Finnegin had offered.  

 

Bethany murmured something low and Fenris gave her the sort of smile that might curl through a woman’s body as he bowed over her hand. _Gracious_.

 

Aeryn managed to make herself shut the door just before her partner swung back around.  Beyond the door, his step was light and only hesitated to lift the latch to his own room.  

 

As Aeryn pulled the latchstring through, Sebastian gave the room a glance.  She’d unpacked her bedroll to air before and set her boots next to the yellow brick chimney that ran up between the center beams of the inn.  Dropping his gear besides a small black enamelled brazier, with a weary sigh he bent to unlace his and toed them off to sit next to hers, wiggling his toes in their stockings against the warmth that radiated from the brick.  Discovering a small pile of twists on the on the coarsely hewn shelf that ran across the bricks- hardly worth the title of “mantle,” he lit one from the brazier and touched it to the wick of a candle sitting in a polished tin sconce to throw a bit more light.

 

Sparsely furnished, smaller than the room Varric and Fenris were sharing, but clean.  A pair of high windows let in light from the moon.  Low, plain furnishings; a table and chair all in dark, old wood and a neatly made bed pressed up to the wall and covered with a bark brown woven blanket, matching the drab braided rug on the wood floor.   In the corner closest to him, there was a shallow hipbath, and the candlelight glinted off of the surface.  Buckets steamed next to it, a sheen of oil on the water.

 

It occurred to him to wonder about the incongruity of Tellend.  A market town with a full Chantry but only one inn. And not the sort he'd have expected to find on a busy crossroads.  The market towns Sebastian had passed through in his rambles before the Chantry and the ones he’d paused in when he made his first attempt to gain support among the nobles had inns that reflected the heavy business that they maintained, if only monthly.  They usually catered to merchants who liked luxury in their accommodations, not ex-Chantry brothers and their ex-mercenary lovers with a penchant for simplicity.  Not to mention, a market town usually had a larger security concern than Tellend seemed prepared for, as reliant on their

Templars as they seemed for protection.

 

  
“Ah!”

 

Aeryn had snaked her arms around his waist from behind and Sebastian felt her jump guiltily when he startled, but he caught her hands before she could jerk away.

 

“Sorry.” She ducked her chin as she tried, halfheartedly, to free herself.

 

Turning in her arms, he kept one hand clasped in his and pressed the other to his hip, not allowing her to break contact. “No, now.  I was just thinking.”

 

“About?”

 

He opened his mouth to answer, “Just,” before shaking his head, “It’s of little importance, I imagine.”  He stepped back, tugging her along to sit with him in the x-framed chair next to the bed, the woven leather of the seat giving a little under their weight.  A few moments passed, with them settled together, fingers woven close.  “I’m glad you’re cuddling again.”

 

“Hmm?”

 

“You seemed a bit disinclined earlier.”  His long lashes brushed along his cheeks and she tilted her head curiously.

 

“I don’t...oh.”  Her little game.  “It was…I was just fooling around.  Teasing.”

 

His eyes went round.  “Teasing?”

 

“You know...stirring the pot a little.  Trying to...”  As Sebastian clearly tried to hold back a grin, she huffed.

 

He couldn’t help the grin at her little incipient pout.  “Did no one ever teach you to tease your lover properly, then?”  

 

His voice had dropped warm and low and Aeryn forced herself not to squirm in his lap, in reaction.  They were both in need of sleep not play.  Instead, she shrugged and told him, “Never found the need, so you know.  Generally all I ever had to do was wink at a likely body, buy a drink and find myself comfortably distracted for an hour or so.”  

 

“Well, that does work.” Sebastian agreed.  “But a bit of play is nice, too.”  He brushed a kiss to her shoulder, falling silent, thinking of long years between them.  

  
  
  
  
  


Aeryn let the silence stretch.  She was steady, now, the momentary weakness that had nearly overwhelmed her pushed aside but Sebastian felt too small against her, fragile and worn..  Here, in the candlelight, the skin around his eyes showed bruised and he kept rubbing at his temple.  Exhaustion was dulling his eyes.

 

Sliding to her feet, she said “Come wash up, love.”  She wanted to pamper him somehow.  There wasn’t much here to work with but his fondness for a bath. Curving her hand around his wrist, Aeryn pulled him standing.

 

He raised his eyebrows.  “Am I rank, then?”

 

“Just a bit,” but she winked and there was no sting in the words.  Led by the grip of her hand, he followed meekly to the plain wooden hipbath that sat in the corner.  The water was tepid and he hitched a breath as he stepped.  

 

Aeryn helped him divest of the rest of his clothing, folding the loose wool tunic as he hitched the leather trousers down.  She reached out and smoothed her fingers along his waist, taut and lean before he sank into the shallow tub to soak from the waist down for a minute.

 

Hefting the rag covered bale in one hand, Aeryn hauled over a still-steaming bucket and carefully added it, Sebastian hissing at the sting of the heat, before she took up a linen rag and the soap to scrub his shoulders.

 

“I c’n manage.”  As if he wasn’t sinking lower, as if his spine wasn’t practically melting at the way the linen felt against his back, the firm touch and heat just what he’d been craving.

 

“I know.  But I _want_ to.” She murmured into his ear, kissing just above the curve.  Tipping his head back and blocking the flow of water from his eyes with one hand, she poured out a tumbler to wet his hair and her fingers massaged soap into his scalp for long minutes until suds formed.  “You need a haircut, darling man.”

 

He nodded, a little vaguely, as he’d nearly been lulled to sleep.  “I’ll see if Varric will.”  He’d sunk as far down into the wash tub as he could manage and sighed over his bent knees.  He ought to be grateful to have a bath at all, but with his knees around his ears, he was hard pressed not to miss the long tub they’d left behind in Ferelden; the deep soaking bath in Aeryn’s estate that had accommodated both of them.   He’d never admit to the daydreams he had about the dwarven built, hypocaust heated baths in the lower levels of the Keep at Starkhaven.

 

“Close your eyes.”  She poured clean water over his head, fingers sliding through the sodden locks and flooding out suds.  “Where’s your kit?”

 

“In m’pack.”  He roused himself enough to be curious and lifted his lids to watch Aeryn rummage deftly before pulling out the small leather bag he kept his shaving gear in.  “What d’you need it for?”

 

“I thought I’d shave that scrub from your chin before you take half my hide off.”

 

“I’ll do it.”

 

“Let me.”

 

Her hand stroked his cheek again and he nuzzled into it, this time. All the sweetness he’d be craving earlier on display and it was beyond him now, not to soak it up.  “Alright.”

 

She lathered up the brush and stroked the foam thickly across his jaw and down his neck.  

 

Sebastian resisted a chuckle, lest he make her hand shift.  He had an assassin at his throat, with the sharpest razor he owned in her wicked hand but all he felt was a pervading sense of well-being as  Aeryn tipped his chin and stroked the blade up, all of her focus on the slip of his skin beneath the sharp edge.  As always, his little thief was efficient and quick and he was clean in minutes, even the back of his neck that he’d neglected in the last week.

 

Aeryn surveyed her work, satisfied with both the shave and the lazy, contented smile curving Sebastian’s mouth and whispered across the small raised scar that was normally hidden just beneath his collar after wiping away the last trace of sud.  “There you go.”

 

He captured her hand and kissed her palm before dropping his head back to look up at her, the soft fond look on her face smoothing away the last lingering pall that their bickering had cast over them.  “Thank you.”  He still needed to make sure she was truly settled as well.  She’d turned soft too quickly, maybe.  Once he had her in the bed with him, then he could...he nearly cracked his jaw with a wide yawn and cut off his own thought as she laughed gently at him.

 

Rubbing at his hair with a bit of toweling, Aeryn managed to get it mostly dry. “C’mon.  The water’s getting chilly.”  She watched him as he stood, water streaming from his body and drawing runic patterns along his skin and toweled off with another length of rough linen she’d handed him before she turned to the cot.  He ignored the pair of trews laid across the chair and dropped to sit on the bed’s edge.

“Give me a moment.”  She started to tidy, laying the towel next to the fire to dry.

 

“Hmm, alright.”  He watched her start to strip off as he settled. “Want help?”  

 

Sebastian had lain on his stomach and folded his hands under his chin to watch, and she smiled at the languid sprawl of him as she shook her head. “No, you look comfortable.”  

 

“Hmm.”

 

He yawned as she stretched out on the floor for a few minutes, the clean line of her body growing wavery as he rubbed his eyes.  The edge of her tunic flashed over her head and as she unbound her breasts, he had to close his lids, just a moment, aching with weariness and too heavy to keep open even to watch, listening to the soft sounds of her body moving in the room.

 

Folding aside the band, Aeryn stood and shook out the last of the tension in her arms and stepped briskly along the tread-smoothed planking.  “You’re awfully quiet, love.”  Sebastian didn’t answer, but there was a soft sound of deep breathing and turning on her heel she saw- he was sound asleep.  

 

“Poor darling….” she broke off her sympathetic murmur to stare in consternation.  He was catty-cornered across the bed.  On top of the blankets she’d checked for vermin earlier and left laid back.  And with his arms wrapped around the pillows cuddled under his chin.  Very comfortable.  

 

“Sodding _Void_.”

 

Tipping her head, Aeryn considered.  She could try and wedge herself in the small space that his long body left on the outside edge, but she’d be fighting to not fall off if he moved.  With only a tiny grumble...it could have been much worse, after all...she snagged her tunic and pulled it back over her head.  She had no interest in the woody, smoky beggar’s lice laden bedrolls airing out by the fire, tonight.  Carefully, she swung her leg over the footboard and curled into the corner, between his side and the wall.  Closing her eyes, she was asleep before she could bother to find the most comfortable angle for her head against the clapboard.  

 

0000000

 

_Stone and thick air and the heavy rotting sweet taste of taint on the back of her tongue.  Deep Roads.  Trapped beneath stone upon stone and swarms of them scurrying up and around them and she can’t can’t can’t see can’t run there’s never anywhere to run there are only walls and stone and mold and she can’t climb fast enough there’s a hand closing on her foot and dragging her no how did she get here she’d been so close to that elusive blue that promised…nothing_

 

Her eyes flew open in the soft dark, the small room stuffy and humid with their body heat and her hands still reaching for the invisible cliff edge.  Forcing herself to stay quiet by biting her lips shut and not wake the man beside her, his breath coming slow and deep. The black pressed in on her, the thin clapboard wall scraping against her back and she gave in.  Craving contact.

 

With just a slight roll of her body her nose was pressed just above his navel.  Slowly, Aeryn opened her clenched fist possessively over his chest, spreading her fingers, slowly, smoothing.  The scent of her Sebastian; sleepy male, warm musk and that faint trace of incense that lingered from his earlier prayers flooded her nostrils driving out the lingering odor of the dream and she opened her mouth to feel the muscle shift under his skin, against her tongue.

 

This, then. This was what she’d missed all the long years and what she’d been denying herself by running away from it.  He’d given his other life up and given her this as her right, the right to wake up instead of dragging herself from a nightmare alone, the right to touch him, lazily trace down the line of cinnamon crisp hair, wander over the plain of his stomach, down a pale white scar along his ribs to the jut of one sharp hip bone.  Salt there and a trace of sweetly sour heat as she suckled a dark mark on the thin golden skin over the bone.   His back arched, he breathed her name like one of his prayers and splayed hard fingers on the velvet spike of her clipped hair.

 

“ _Aeryn_.”

 

Pausing in her pursuit, she glanced up guiltily into his sleepy, blinking eyes.  “Sorry.  I didn’t mean to wake…” but she stopped.  Yes, she had. She brushed her cheek against his thigh before she sat up.  Moonlight streamed in and the blue brimmed with words, trying to escape.  “What is it, love?”

 

He could hardly get the words out, though.  Here in the dark, he was vulnerable to the Fade, too, she knew. “Don’t stop.”

 

“Never.” Aeryn could read the way Sebastian’s eyes dropped, the jaw that was tightly clenched that he’d been dreaming, too, and she set herself into swearing oaths with every inch of her body.

 

She had to uncurl her hands again to reach out to lace between his fingers, instead, pinning his hands with her own, binding herself as much as him.  “Not _ever_.”  She lifted one of his hands to her mouth, shifting her grip to trace the mound of his palm and to press a kiss against the tiny puckered scar.  With her eyes on his Aeryn whispered up each of Sebastian’s long fingers and met each calloused tip with another kiss.  When she reached the broader pad of his thumb, she sucked the length of it into her mouth.

 

Sebastian groaned low, as her fingers brushed down his wrist and the corded strength of his forearm, the rest of his fingers curving around her jaw as she laved attention on his thumb, never taking her eyes, smoky and full of dark promises, from his.  “ _Mo chride_ ,” he gasped as she dragged the stunningly sensitized digit out of her mouth, scraping it along the sharp flat of her teeth.

Her lips brushed his stomach again, following the lift of his ribs, the snub tip of her nose nudging the flat of his nipple just before her tongue traced the curve dragging up.  A sharp nip had him gasping, his hips jerking against her as the soft skin of her belly pressed against his cock.

 

Her face fit in the curve of his neck and she breathed in the soft scent of soap root and the rose oil she’d floated on his bath before she flicked her tongue against the hollow, tasting salt that had sprung up in the wake of her exploration.  

 

Sebastian gripped her hands tight and let his head drop back with a groan.  “Please, _a ruin_.” His fingers itched to touch her, to feel the way muscle played under her skin, the plump luxury of her breasts in his hands as she worked her way back up his body with lips and tongue and the occasional graze of teeth.  

 

He trembled under her as she traced the curve of his ear.  Sebastian fought to lift his head up and nibbled along the line of muscle at her shoulder.  Aeryn found the tendon and nipped, feeling him stiffen further against her, and every muscle lock under her.  

 

“I need…”

 

“What do you need, love?”  she murmured.  Her hips rocked into his, his cock trapped against her stomach and he groaned again and gave into her lead.  

 

“Don’t stop.”

 

“Not planning on it.” She whispered against his mouth, a throaty sound of satisfaction that ran right down his spine before she nudged his mouth open to sweep her tongue in, savoring before it twined with his.  

 

Her hand let go of one of his and ran teasingly down his side until she could grip him to tug firmly and he whimpered under her, his hand clutching the edge of the mattress as his hips bucked again.  

 

Sebastian gasped a huge lungful of cool air, trying to distract himself enough not to come just from the commanding touch. He wrenched his desire in line and then lost himself again in the silken slide of her body down his hot skin only to gulp again as her mouth and the little pointed tongue hotter still, sucked, licked down his rigid flesh and brought him to the edge.  

 

She teased, her lips just brushing around the sensitive glans and he pressed his fists into the mattress to keep himself from coming, coming undone before she’d hardly started.

 

He moaned and Aeryn clamped her thighs together, trapping a pulse of want that lanced through her body at the half-sobbed sound, a throb centered on her clit and paused a moment trying to think as Sebastian muttered, complaining in vague Starkish pressing one hand against his eyes as the other fisted in the thin slubby homespun sheeting at her delay.  He was tired and she’d meant to just take the flavor of him...but Maker, she needed him.  

 

Aeryn knelt up beside him, her grip shifting from tight to only just the teasing drift of her fingers as he shuddered and followed, pushing himself upright with freed hands.  To seek out her mouth again, to beg entrance with entreating lips and his fingers sketching along her jaw.  

 

She made him work for his want, until the softness of his mouth sliding against hers made her want to yield, lips, tongue and all.  The lilt of more Starkish, this time happy and approving as he skimmed her shirt off, tickled a giggle out of her just before he suckled on her tongue, traced a callused thumb over her tight nipple and drove language appreciation out of her mind.  Winding her fingers into his curling hair, Aeryn licked the roof of his mouth for the hum of need it always earned her.  Long, insistent fingers were pressing between her thighs and she straddled his broader one as he shifted his other hand,  clutching her arse to drag her closer.

 

Tearing her mouth away from the drugging lure of Sebastian’s lips, she protested against his throat even as she rubbed, aching and hot, against the rasp of hair curling across his thigh, “I was going to...”

 

“Later.” Sebastian growled and when his hand shifted again, Aeryn felt her control yanked away.  She was suddenly flat on her back, the thin mattress barely padding against the ropes of the cot and pinned by his eyes, now wide and blazing in the moonlight as he knelt between her thighs.

 

He spread her with one hand and thumbed her clit through the wet linen, blunting the sensation as he yanked the tie and dragged them from her with clawed fingers.   Another insistent press of his thumb sent jagged spikes of sensation pulsing with her heartbeat.

 

Fast, his mouth in a firm line, in one hard, smooth roll of his hip he drove into her.  Aeryn cried out and rolled up to meet him, locking her heels around his thighs and, instead of spurring him on, simply rode out the punishing rhythm Sebastian set in his first few movements, shocks of pain tagging the heels of pleasure.  

 

Sebastian sought out her hands, locking them down intending to preempt her normal hurrying, the nails raking his shoulders.  It took a few moments, the slick pulse of her muscle around his cock so hot, utterly enthralling, before it penetrated his sleep and lust-fogged mind, for him to realize she wasn’t urging him on with heel and trying to rush their pace, that she was yielding far more than usual.  Her eyes were closed, scrunched shut and her lip was caught between her teeth.

 

“A...aeryn…” Sebastian stilled and only then did her eyes open, blinking wide.

 

“What?  What’s the matter?”

 

Her whole body had gone tense beneath him and he only just slammed a lid on panic as he choked out, “Did...have I hurt you?”  She’d been soaked to the touch even though he’d only briefly tested but, _Maker, please..._

 

Before he could pull away, apology stuttering from his mouth, Aeryn tightened her legs to prevent his cock from slipping out.  “ _No_...I’m _fine_.  Please, I just thought...slower but I want you.   _Please_ , don’t stop.”

 

Halting, Sebastian considered a moment, his hands releasing hers to stroke down the line of her breastbone, follow the soft arch of her ribs and span the edges of her hipbones watching the reaction of her skin and letting the way Aeryn arched into his touch reassure him, even as he noted the chill across her stomach, the gooseflesh on her arms and the darkness in the room.  

 

She’d woken him up, long before the night was gone.  She _never_ woke him.  Not on purpose.

 

But she had tonight.  With eyes huge in the dark and tension in her spine and apologies on her lips again as she’d pulled him to the edge along with her.

 

Adjusting his hold on her other hand, Sebastian tugged, pulling her until she curled up from the waist and waited until her arms came sweetly around his neck and she set her forehead against his, nearly eye level sitting up on his thighs.  “I’m no’ going anywhere.  I’m all yours.”  He spoke his lips feathering across hers with each word.  “And if it’s slow you need, I c’n give it.”

 

Aeryn shivered as he spoke, the low and intimate purr a caress in itself, so close that his features blurred into blue..  All the promises in his voice, warm and darkly sweet as any summer forest.  His hand closed around her hip, the other at the nape of her neck, his thumbs rubbing slow circles on her skin, setting off sparks.

 

She tightened her thighs, pressed closer still to his heart steady as metronome against hers and the rhythm of it smoothing out her jangled nerves.  

 

“Is this better?”  She nodded and smiled when he brushed soft kisses against her eyelids.  “Are y’sure?”

 

In this position, more than any other, loving Sebastian was like being joined with late summer, surrounded by burnished gold and ruddy brown and that brilliant, harvest blue sky of his eyes, creased in concern when he looked at her. How could it not be better?

 

With a writhe of her hips that had him hauling in a breath as his shaft slid further into the silken clutch of her body, “Much better.  Oh...yeah...much…” she breathed, tracing down his cheekbone, his jaw until she could tongue the cord of his neck, feeling it snap taut.

 

With a scrabbling hold on his control, he held his hips quiet and let his mouth travel the mound of her breast, pressed hot against his chest, trailing one hand around to lift the hard dark pink tip to suckle as she clenched around him.  

 

Suspended minutes passed and tiny kisses traded as her skin warmed through and a faint blush climbed her throat and matched the desire blazing across his cheekbones.  

 

Fingertips dug into the meat of his shoulders, Aeryn slid up and sank down again,watching the pupil of his eyes blow out and drown all but the faint lyrium flare edge of blue.  “You feel so good.”  She whispered, nipping the downy curve of his earlobe, the answering shudder running the length of his spine and thrusting his hips up, making her gasp in return.

 

His mouth dropped open to suck in a breath and Aeryn snagged his lower lip in her teeth, worrying it until he lunged forward, bracing one arm on the rough wall.  

 

He’d kept his movements as small as he could but every nerve was screaming, his cock tight and balls heavy.  It was his turn to clench his eyes shut, hanging on with every last inch of will he had but... “ _Á ruin...mo chridhe_ I can’t…I want...”

 

The words throbbed through her gut and in answer she growled into his ear, ”Fuck me….love me…now _now_ ….” and he let go, her back pressed to the wall and legs so tight around his hips he thought there’d be bruises come the morning but all he could care about just now was the mindless urge to move, bury himself in the scent of her, the heat, her welcoming cunt, her fingers yanking his hair back to suck at his mouth, his chin and _need_ burning down his spine, enclosed in throbbing heat as her breath squeaked out with every impact. As he came, Sebastian buried his face against her hair, lungs locked and whole body rigid.

 

White noise still rushing in his ears, Sebastian shook his vision clear with fingernails dug into the wood behind them. He lifted his head    Her eyes were wide black with want, swollen mouth open and panting.

 

When he moved delicately inside her, still hard, Aeryn gasped and let her head fall back against the rugged board behind her with a thud. “Sod.”

 

He pulled away, letting her slide down the wall.  She protested with a whine that cut off as he curled down, long body sinuous with his release, moving in grace to give hers.  Hands trailing, fingernails scraping over her shoulders, down her breasts across her belly to press her thighs wider and the low purr in his voice when he revealed her, wet and hot.  

 

Aeryn looked down at his ruddy head between her spread legs, the air musky with sex, and felt another tightening ache lash through her as she drew her knees up to latch over his wide shoulders.  She couldn’t hold back a needy whimper as he nudged between her lips, found her, hot breath as he murmured, “I’ve got you, I’ve got you.” One hand forced under her arse, stroking fingers against moist skin to urge her back to him.

  
Sebastian nuzzled, the taste of his seed mingling with her tart juices such a strangely enticing draw that he was tempted to lick her clean.  But she was so _close_ , trembling under him, against him.  He couldn’t tease at all, desperation in her every heaved breath a spur to his need to make her come.

 

It only took a tongue pressed hard, once, twice to her hard little clit, his fingers curling in a wave in her tight channel to have her thrusting into his hand, back arching up off the mattress nearly forcing him backwards as she clutched his head, shaking through her climax.  

 

Tremors snaked their way along her nerves as Sebastian lifted his mouth away, peppering kisses over her mound and belly, across the ridges of her hip bones.   _Love you, mo chridhe, anam chara I love you_ between each fluttering touch as her breathing slowed and she could relax her hold on his curls; threading them, damp silk through her fingers.  He laid his cheek against her stomach, strong arms coming up to wrap her warm.  

 

“I...I love you so, Sebastian.”  Her hand traced the curve of his ear, the arch of his brow, along his throat trailing.  

  
He felt her low murmur in his bones, the catch of rough fingers on his skin and smiled, home again.


	31. Chapter 31

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Thanks to faejilly for her beta, though all mistakes are mine._

 

Aeryn woke up warm and soft, rare enough in winter that her spine involuntarily stretched and her toes curled into the decidedly unluxurious texture of the slubby homespun sheeting.  She stopped in mid-stretch, though, as her mind caught up.  Sebastian was curled around her like an oven at her back and snoring lightly, though he’d eventually moved to the pillow and straightened out somewhat, wrapping their legs together at some point.  

 

A burning twinge seared along her shoulder as she moved slowly, untangling them.  The wall had been pretty rough and neither she nor Sebastian had given it much notice last night, she recalled with a small smile.  She had one...no, two scrapes across her back to go along with a pretty nice set of little bruises across her hips.  Nothing that a little salve wouldn’t heal up.  

 

She lifted his hand up to her mouth and placed a kiss on his wrist bone and then his palm before setting it aside and slithering out of bed, resisting the urge to kiss his temple, the corner of his mouth that had crooked up, the three dark freckles that made a triangle on his collarbone or the arch of a thin scar over his shoulder blade.  Resolutely, she only tugged their blanket back up over his shoulder as he slid over on his stomach with a sigh.

 

The shallow milk glass jar of salve she’d had she’d used on Sebastian’s shoulder last night was empty, but she ran her finger around the bottom futilely anyway as she glanced at his belt pouches.  He had some too, but...no.  He was keeping a secret in a small pretty box and she didn’t want to accidentally wander across it.  Better hit Bethany up.  One of the scrapes was going to be awkward to get to, anyway.  Yanking her tunic over her head and the pair of smalls she’d rinsed out and left to dry overnight on the shelf under the brazier up over her arse, Aeryn strapped the slender stiletto to her thigh, grabbed her trousers and tiptoed out the door.  

 

Making sure the coast was clear, Aeryn padded down the hall, keeping her feet on the worn hard-spun rugging.  No reason to flash poor Finnegin or his maids if they were up early, though the gloom out of her window said it was still a bit before dawn.

 

Bethany was likely asleep but it wasn’t much of a trick to sneak in and out.  A bit of a fiddle with the less than secure latch and...Ah.  Easy enough.

 

Slowly opening the door, Aeryn frowned to find the room was dark and chilled, an old odor of wet coals hanging in the air.  The small brazier was out and Bethany was…”Beth, what’s wrong?”

 

“I...I’m fine.  I’m _fine_.”  

 

“Yes, you sound dandy.”   _What in the world?_

 

“Just...didn’t sleep well.” An empty smile drifted across her face. “Dreaming.”

 

_oh_.  And she’d put the fires out.

 

Bethany had never been a firebug, exactly.  But it had always been there, just on the tips of her fingers.  Her first magic had been fire sparks.  Whenever she lost control, it had been fire.  There had always been a draw and the fact that the brazier was out told Aeryn enough.

 

She laid her trousers over the foot of the bed and slowly crossed the tiny room.  “It’s alright, Beth.  Beth-a-ny.  Bethany Hawke.  Look at me.”  She let her voice drop as low as she could get it, slowing down her cadence.  Bethany looked up and Aeryn caught her eyes.  

 

“I’m alright, Aeryn.”

 

“I know all about that. I know.  How long?”  

 

Bethany closed her eyes only to open them, too hastily to dismiss.  “Just tonight.  All by myself.”  

 

“Yeah, I know about that, too.  I was just down the hall.  Fenris…”

“I don’t want him to think…to think I’m not in control.”

 

“Okay.  Later.”  Aeryn paused.  “Can I sit with you?”

 

“Hmm?  Yes.”  Bethany’s eyes were trying to skitter to the window and Aeryn closed the space between them.

 

She knelt up on the bed and folded up tailor style, knees just brushing Bethany’s, just close enough for their warmth to pass over.  She was warm, still holding warmth from Sebastian’s attention. Bethany nearly radiated a chill.  Ice wasn’t her sister’s go to offensively, but she used it defensively so often it was nearly instinctive.  

 

“Hey it’s alright.  I’m here now, okay?”  She pulled the thigh blade out and laid it on the tightly pulled coverlet and cracked a tiny vial that slid into the hidden pocket, letting gleam pale and green on the metal.  “Magebane.”

 

Surprise flashed in Bethany’s eyes even as the chill in her skin abated.  “Still?”

 

“Kirkwall for eight years, remember?”  She flashed half a smile at Bethany’s rueful chuckle.  “Did you ever have trouble there?”

 

“Too busy. Teaching, keeping everyone else _mostly_ sane.  For all the good it did.  Once...after...Mother.”

 

“What did you do then?”  She almost absently held her hand up, palm forward and waited a few beats until Bethany slid her palm against it, curling her longer fingers over the tips of Aeryn’s.

 

“That’s...that’s when Cullen and I...he understood.  He sat with me.  Made me feel safe until I could close my eyes again.”  

 

“Well, remind me to send him a bottle of something nice.  What does he like, besides brunettes?”

 

“Tea.  He didn’t drink.  Said it made him feel all fizzy.”

 

“Definitely stick with tea then, fizzy templars are no laughing matter, certainly.”  Bethany laughed anyway and Aeryn tsked.  “No respect, at all.”

 

Consciously, she slowed down her blinking and Bethany followed, her breath coming down to match Aeryn’s and the small rhythmic circle her off hand had been rubbing into the fuzz on the wool stilled.  “Got your box out?”

 

“Have to keep slamming the lid back shut.”  

 

“Okay.  That’s good.  It’s been a while, remind me.  Where do you keep it?”

 

“In the woods, by the river.  Remember that little stream, out back of the cabin.  In the forest?”

 

“I remember.”   

 

Her sister’s soft voice fell in pitch and the words came easily, if vague. “There was a little hollow bank.  It was the best place to play house.  We used to find elf arrowheads there all the time.”

 

“And a plate...that little glass plate you and Carver found there.”

 

“With the carving on the edge.  I still have that, in my chest.  That’s where it is, it’s open...they’re always talking. If I was stronger…”

 

Aeryn redirected her, “Not now, Bethany.  Why did you build the box?”  Gently, curiously.

 

“To keep them in.”  

 

“To keep them out.  Out of that forest.  Out of the world.  They don’t belong.  You belong.  What will happen in the forest if we let them out?”

 

“It dies.”

 

“That’s right.  That’s why Father built us boxes.  Because we’re strong enough to keep it all out.  And the box reminds us why.  Is it nice there?”

 

“Cool, quiet.  Just the stream.  And the little fish.”

 

“The ones with red spots behind their ears?”

 

“Yes.” Chill stung along Aeryn’s fingertips, burning like the beginning of frostbite.  “I almost wasn’t.  You almost died.”

 

No redirect this time.  Confront it then, with easy truth. “But I didn’t.”

 

The pupil of Bethany’s eyes contracted suddenly.  “You get into so much trouble.  How did Anders stand it?”

 

“He was a _healer_ and I kept him busy.  Threw up on him a couple of times.  It’s not your job to keep me whole, Beth.  That’s my job.”

 

“You’re terrible at it.”

 

_Small smile to match Beth’s_.  “Yeah, I know.  Still _my_ job.  Not yours.  Where’s the box?”

 

Her other hand reached out over the coverlet.  “Right here, there’s moss.”

 

“On the box?  That deep, rich green?”  

 

“Mmhmm.  It’s so lovely.  Soft.”

 

“Yes, it is.  Close the box, Bethany.”  Aeryn’s fingertips had warmed back up.

 

“Hmm.  Alright.”  

 

Aeryn gave her a few beats, breathing a little more normally, stroking her fingertips up the pads of her sister’s softer hands.  “Where’s the box?”

 

“I’m sitting on it.  It’s a nice view, the trees bending over the river.  So nice and cool.  I...wish we hadn’t had to leave.”

 

“Me, too.”  Aeryn whispered.

 

“Is your box here too?”

 

“Used to be.”

 

Dark, winged brows slid up. “Where is it now?”

 

“Fenris’.  That little upstairs chest of drawers he used to keep his corks on.  Sometimes he used to throw old bottles at it for me.”

 

“Does Sebastian mind?”    

 

Aeryn paused.  Sebastian hadn’t ever needed to know.  And it was time to end this.  “Are you too cool?  ‘Cause I’m a little chilled here, sweet Hawke.”

 

“Oh...right.  Let me,” flame guttered along the edge of Bethany’s shapely fingers though it didn’t touch Aeryn this time and then brightened, the candle on the bedside table flickered and, finally, the brazier flared back into life.  

 

“There’s my girl.  Good job, Bethany Hawke.”   

 

Bethany blinked a few times quickly, clearing her eyes of the sting of blinking too slowly for too long.  “Aeryn?  Did you break into my room?”

 

“Our innkeeper needs sturdier locks on his doors.  Are you hungry?”  Aeryn bounced up on her toes, and stretched her back like a cat.

 

Bethany stretched too, feeling oddly stiff considering she’d only just woken.  “I could eat a stalled ox, for some reason.”

 

“Me too.  Long night.”

 

Her sister held up a hand warningly.  “No...do not _share_.”

 

Innocence proclaimed itself across her face, “I wouldn’t! Sebastian is shy about that sort of thing.”   Aeryn grinned then, all mischief, and Bethany swatted her shoulder.

 

“Why did you break in, anyway?”

 

“Entered _quietly_ ,” Aeryn said in an injured tone as Bethany rolled her eyes.   “Oh, just needed to borrow some salve.  Got a couple of scrapes yesterday and I ran out.”

 

Bethany pointed out her satchel.  “Hmm, I’m about out as well.  We’re out of a lot of things that you can’t just pick up on the fly.  I’d hate to get into a real fight without a few stronger lyrium draughts.”

 

“One of the things Varric worked out with the dwarves was a lyrium supply, but we’ll have to be settled for you to brew anything up.” Aeryn glanced into the small kettle and wrinkled her nose at the scorched bottom, hastily replacing the lid.  “Speaking of which, you’re out of water.  We’ll have to go down for tea.”  

 

Muffled until her head reappeared from the neck of her over-tunic, Bethany asked, “You said breakfast, too?  Here, give me that.”  She dipped her fingers into the small jar Aeryn had fished from the pack and daubed salve across the reddened scrape on Aeryn’s lower back, just visible where she’d pulled her tunic up.  “There. Now for goodness sake put your clothes on, you shameless hussy.”  

 

“The one thing I miss about Kirkwall is not needing to be fully dressed the whole blighted day.” Aeryn grumbled, snagging her trousers off the back of the splintery chair.   

 

“Please tell me you didn’t run around the estate naked all the time?”  Bethany begged as she turned for Aeryn to draw the laces on her corselet.  “Poor Bodahn.”  

 

“Not _all_ the time, no.”  Aeryn tugged and tied them off, before tucking them in securely.  “C’mon, I smell frying ham.”

 

Bethany was almost out of her door when Aeryn scuffed the back of her head with her hand, ruffling the shorn dark red hair and showing pale scalp beneath.   “Oh, wait.  I found something for you.”  She plucked up the scarf she’d bought the day before and fluttered it out with a flourish.

 

“For me?”

 

“Early nameday, if you’d like?”

 

Aeryn spread the finely woven wool over the span of her fingers.  “This is gorgeous.  Thank you.”  Winding it around her head, she tucked in the ends as they descended the stairs.

 

There was ham, a steaming fruit compote rich with apples and studded with raisins, and a platter of coddled eggs as well as loaves of bread and various spreads set before Fenris and Varric when the women joined them.  

 

“Sebastian is not awake?”  Fenris glanced up the stairs, with something like concern between his eyebrows and Aeryn couldn’t help cocking a half-smile at him.   

 

“He’s fine.  I’m letting him sleep in.”  She dropped into the chair beside Varric, leaving the other to Bethany who sat less dramatically, with her own soft smile to Fenris who had pulled her chair out, and promptly hogged the egg platter; scooping a large ladleful to the waiting plate.  

 

The maid from the night before, looking sleepy-eyed and quietly happy, brought out a fresh pot of tea and nodded when Aeryn asked for some hot water.  

 

She laid a slice of bread and a spoonful of egg onto the wooden trencher.  Nibbling at a bit of crisped ham, she pointed out the route Sebastian had suggested on Fenris’ map.  Fenris frowned and glanced at Varric before saying, “It seems a roundabout way to get to our destination.”

 

Aeryn poured a packet of tea leaves into the pot the girl brought.  “He’s got a plan in mind and at any rate, we have to meet Cleve and he’s not like to have made it home yet.”  

 

“The plan being?”  Varric asked, spearing another slice of bread with the point of his table knife.

 

“He’s taking the roundabout way to Starkhaven and it has something to do with a very small box he’s been carrying and the fact that he doesn’t want to get to Raven’s Reach without certain events having been recognized by the Chantry.”  Aeryn grinned, “But I’m not supposed to have figured that out.  So...if one of you might like to puzzle it out with him, be my guest.”  

 

She swallowed the last of the tea in her cup and then topped it off with the smaller pot.  Bethany slid her cup over as well and Aeryn did her best to casually fill it up with their father’s mixture.  

 

Bethany ate another bite of bread, pointedly pushed the eggs back towards Aeryn and lifted her cup in a toast.  

  


0000000

 

Waking up warm in winter was a rare enough occurrence that Sebastian wondered if he might be dreaming, even as his spine stretched involuntarily and his toes curled into the uneven texture of the sheeting.

 

He blinked and glanced around blearily, recalling that he’d fallen back asleep pillowed against Aeryn’s thigh.  But she was gone now and he forced himself up on his elbows to look, letting his cocoon of blanket slip down to his hips.  Not so warm now, he winced as the cold air struck his chest.

 

Ah, not gone.  “Is it morning, then,” he asked trying to hide his relief when he spied her.  

 

Aeryn looked up from the boot she’d been working saddle soap into and the dimpled smile she sent him felt like sunshine on his skin.

 

“Well past.  The market’s been going on for a couple of hours.” She nodded towards the window and Sebastian could just hear the bustle and call of a crowd outside.  “Fenris, Varric and Bethany are gathering up the last of what we couldn’t get yesterday.”

 

“You let me sleep so late?”  He stretched his palms up to the sky and swung them in front, loosening his back.  Not even a twinge from his shoulder for the first time in days, thank Andraste for small miracles.  “We should have been on the road.”

 

She shrugged, laying the boot aside, next to his larger pair.  “I had gear to clean and I do so _like_ watching you sleep, all sprawled out and comfortable.  Snoring a bit, even.”  

 

He snorted at her, “I could have helped, though.”  Slinging the woolen blanket over his shoulders and tucking the last around his hips, Sebastian briefly considering prowling across the floor to lay his head on her knees again and bathe in the glow of her eyes.  But no.  They had distance to make today. _Later,_ he promised himself.  

 

Aeryn stood up, too and he kissed her forehead chastely as she pointed out a tray on the  rickety side table.  “Brought up bread and cheese.  Some pretty decent ham.  You should eat.”  He started to tear a hunk of bread off before he eyed her.  “Don’t look at me like that! I ate plenty.”

 

“Just a bite more?”  Not an order but with a plea in his eyes. He placed the torn bit against her lips and waited until she tossed her head and took a bite, the tiniest tip of her tongue catching the pad of his finger and jerking a breath from him in payment for acquiescence.  

 

“Only because it was good.”  

 

It _was_ quite good, soft and laced with honey, and Sebastian polished off the tray while she restrapped her leathers in place and laced her clean boots.

 

As he dressed, sighing a little as he put on his least dirty clothes, Aeryn pulled out her kohl and paint to do her face.  He came up behind her while she traced one eye, then the other, in dark kohl and ran a brush into the pot of color to darken her lips.  

 

It wasn’t the same as she’d worn in Kirkwall and Denerim, where she’d been careful to keep a noble’s made up mask in place most days.  But the crisp lines around her eyes gave her a more refined air than she’d worn since leaving Robard’s ship on the Wounded Coast.  Not the guard she’d been pretending to for weeks, now.  Leaning over, he laid a kiss to the side of her neck and gazed at her sly reflection.  “No more rough guard, with mud on her cheek and low speech on her tongue?”

 

“So you decreed, oh prince.”

 

“And if your judgment tells you different, _run biodagain_?”

 

“I can turn on a copper, don’t you worry.”  Aeryn recapped the wee jar before adding, “I didn’t realize it had bothered you.”

 

“Not me.  It wounds you.”  When she lifted her eyebrows in the mirror, the speckled glass reflecting startled surprise, Sebastian turned her in his arms.   “Somehow….I don’t understand why, but you’ve looked bruised about it.  I don’t want it to go on.”  

 

“I...it isn’t that it _hurts_ me, exactly.”  When he tried to object she tiptoed up and kissed him.  “It pushes me away from you.  It singles me out as a tool, sets you out of my reach.  And I know it isn’t true.”  

 

“But it’s there none the less?”

 

She shrugged.  “Yes.”  

 

“Then, absolutely never again for more than a brief trick.”   

 

Still up on her toes, Aeryn slid her arms around his neck before plumping another kiss on his mouth. “Aye, my liege,” she teased him for the autocratic tone he’d tried to slip in.    

 

“Minx.”  Backing her against the table, Sebastian nipped her lips again, tasting honey from the bread.  “Mmm.”  

 

“Hmm.  We’ve a few minutes before our innkeeper throws us out for better paying customers?”  Aeryn let her last word drift up into a question and twined her fingers under his wrist guard where Sebastian had closed his hand on her hip.  He was warm and he smelled lovely and _really, what was a few minutes?_

 

“No, now.  Next time you have me, I intend to give you hours in a room with a proper bed and a fireplace and snacks and a nice bottle of something.”  Sebastian grinned as he teasingly peppered kisses along her hairline, making her giggle and duck her head.

 

Finally, Aeryn cuffed his shoulder, gently, and cut off his daydreaming with a fond smile, “Daft man.  Well, then, by all means let us be on our way.”  She glanced at herself in the wavery mirror again, “ _After_ I fix this mess you’ve made of me.  I should make you do it.”

 

He shrugged and replied, “I don’t think I’d do it properly, only ever used kohl.”

 

Really?

 

“It’s not an uncommon practice for men of the North to use as many cosmetics as their women, _leannan_.  More on occasion, even.”

 

“Oh.  Well.”  Aeryn closed her eyes.  “Maker’s _breath_.”

 

“What?” he asked worriedly.  Her hands had clutched around the little paint kit.

 

“Just trying to fix _that_ particular image in my mind for all time,” she gave him a dreamy smile that turned wicked when her eyes flashed open, ”Ha, never mind, we’re going to try it right now!”

 

“Aeryn!”  Sebastian batted away the fine paint brush in her hand.  “We need to go or so you said!”

 

Aeryn pouted just a tiny bit as she put away her gear and took up her pack. “Spoilsport.”

 

“Maybe for your birthday, then,” he conceded, hiding a delighted grin by straightening the shoulderstraps for her, to make sure it settled well.  He’d missed the playful side of her, since Denerim.  

 

Dropping the tray off on the bar, they took their leave of Finnegin and headed to the market set up around the square, the bustle and loud clamor a marked change from the quiet village they’d entered the day before.  Sebastian took her arm when a squabble of over-excited children dashed around them as they skirted the edge of a group of matrons bickering over the quality of the cloth merchant’s goods. Aeryn only glanced up at him from the corner of her eye and stroked a finger soothingly up his arm guard.

 

They caught up with Varric at the fletcher’s, grumbling over the price of bolts.  

 

“Can’t you excommunicate someone for highway robbery?”  Varric complained.

 

“I’m afraid I was never at that level of authority.”  He frowned at the sheaf of arrows closest to him.  “This does seem a bit exorbitant, though.”  Sebastian picked one, fletched plainly in brown and white, up and rotated it in his fingers, sighting down the length.  It would fly near true, if perhaps somewhat short.  

 

The plump merchant turned from her trade of a bag of feathers from one of the scampering children and replied curtly, “Nobody’s making you buy them.  If you’re too lazy to make your own and too cheap to pay me to sit around to do it, you’re welcome to hope you find ‘em laying on the side of the road.”

 

Aeryn rolled her eyes.  “Pick out what you need and stop criticizing the woman for making a living.  We need them and you’re both perfectly capable of fine tuning tonight at camp.”

 

The woman, washed out blue eyes sharp and hair going gracefully from blonde to white tucked neatly back, asked her, “You’re travelling?”  

 

Aeryn only nodded but Varric added, “On our way to Cleve,” and side-eyed Aeryn when she stilled beside him.  He knew just how chatty to be to keep people at ease, despite the fact that Hawke was less forthcoming.  It was only one reason why she’d always liked to have him along.

 

The pale blue gaze narrowed and the thought crossed Aeryn’s mind that this woman had been a hunter at some point, not too long ago.  “You’re them folk what cleared out the bandits.  Everyone’s talking about it.  Well...you probably aren’t lazy then.”  She eyed Bianca and Sebastian’s bow with a professional appreciation. “Here.  Come help me with these.”  She pointed out two chests still in the cart; small polished cases, strapped in supple leather and banded in brass and Sebastian reached in and pulled one to the wagongate.  Varric opened the first while Sebastian dragged the other forward.  

 

“Most folks coming through here just need broadheads.   Points and such.  These are a bit better.”  

 

The arrows she revealed in the nondescript chests were, indeed, a fair bit finer.  Elvhen made and some of the elegant, slim shafts were clearly enchanted.  “M’ husband’s Dalish.  He don’t get out much, but,” she shrugged to Aeryn who’d arched an eyebrow at the ironbark shafts Sebastian was trying not to gawk at, “he hasn’t lost his touch and he can get the occasional rune and such from his...friends.”

 

“Oh, m’lady, your husband has some good friends.”  Varric grinned as he carefully picked up a dragonbone point and slid his thumb along the edge.  “Give this lady your purse, Chuckles.”  

  


_As bad as “Killer” had been that one was worse, ugh._  Aeryn cocked an eyebrow at him but nodded at the woman to go ahead and total up the price for the weaponry being piled with rather alarming abandon onto the table by her two archers.  

 

She wandered away after paying, while Varric and Sebastian resorted the ready made arrows and bolts into their quivers.  There was a carter set up selling sausages and another selling fried pies and Aeryn bought enough of each to make an easy luncheon later.  This time of year, there wasn’t much to be found, scrounging, and though they’d likely be passing farmsteads, Aeryn had no interest in pinching chickens these days.  Be a bit hard to explain why the prince was taking tithe before actually taking a throne, anyway.  

 

She was idly investigating a pair of beetlewing scabbards, when Fenris found her.  He was quiet as he watched her and finally she turned to him.  “Hey.  Got what you need?”

 

“Bethany is finishing with the miller.”  He nodded and continued to stand slightly apart.  

 

“Alright.” She had long enough experience to know that, whatever was bubbling under Fenris’ surface, wheedling would only draw it out if they were in private.  Here, it was best to let him simmer.   “What do you think?”

 

“They are more decorative than practical, for your use?”  He pointed out where the leather would catch poorly on the smaller hilts of her daggers.

 

“You’re probably right.” She walked on and he followed.

 

“She was limping yesterday.  And she looks poorly rested this morning.”

 

“Beth?” He made a small grimace and she grinned at him.  “Yeah. I know.  She was supposed to pad that boot with some sheepskin until we can have another cobbler rebuild it.”

 

He nodded, his brow lightning a little.  “She made that purchase yesterday.”  

 

As for the other…”Bethany didn’t sleep well last night,” she admitted. “But I don’t think it’s anything you should be concerned about.  She’s been working hard and travelling harder and it’s still a pretty new life for her, considering.  All this wandering.”

 

“That is so.”

 

“That said...all you can do is ask her.”  Fenris tipped his head in understanding.  For all that little was secret between them, Bethany was her sister.  If it wasn’t hers to share then it was better he discover it himself.   

 

“Prydin was a large town, when I went through a decade ago.”  Fenris mused.  “There was a large theater with a resident troupe.  Do you think she would enjoy an evening at such an event?  She...well, she seemed to be amused by the small entertainments that Queen Deirdre organized.”

 

“A play?” Aeryn asked.   “She used to love them.  Especially something with a bit of a light touch.”

 

“Will we have time?”

 

“I think we’ll be in town for at least a week, waiting for Cleve.  Even with the jaunts to weed out bandits, there’s no reason we can’t have some fun.”  

 

“It was easier with Isabela, I admit.  She had less interest in...courting.”  Aeryn couldn’t help her laugh at his gift for understatement.  “Yes, well, would you and Sebastian accompany us?”  

 

He wasn’t prepared for the startled look that raced across her features and it wasn’t until they drew up in the shelter of a larger cart out of the clipping wind that she answered finally.  “I guess we could.  Let me ask Sebastian.”

 

“You never did that sort of thing either in Kirkwall, did you?”

 

“No.  Lots of...this.”  Aeryn waved at the market.  “Lots of quiet at home time.  But...not out. Just that one dance, where we met Therese.”

 

Fenris snorted, the laugh starting to come easier.  “These wild romances we’ve had, Hawke.  It is something of a wonder anyone looks at us twice.”  

 

“Well, we are pretty, at least.”  She grinned at him.  “We can start to make up for it, though.  Hey, sis.  Good shopping?”  She asked as Bethany neatly sidestepped a chattering pair of young women.  

 

“Yes, I think so.  Why do you keep making me do it?” Fenris took the laden basket and Aeryn slipped a string bag off of Bethany’s arm, relieving her of all but her pack of dried herbs.

 

“Because they all stumble over themselves to offer you bargains when you flutter those big brown eyes, sister dear.”

 

Varric and Sebastian caught them up, finally.  They had to pause at the edge of the market to shift the purchases among themselves and Sebastian took the chance on something he’d been considering.  

 

As he watched Aeryn settle a heavy pack across Bethany’s back, Sebastian commented, “We could buy a pack horse.  There’s a stable just over there.”  He pointed out the farrier’s behind Finnegin’s.

 

Aeryn shrugged as she fiddled with the leather lacings to secure the strapping.  “We could, but odds are we’d only be hiring it and then we’d have to hire someone to bring it back.  And we still have that little tail of mountain to cross.  No guarantee we could feed an animal in the heights, without needing another to haul their own oats.  And then we’d need to buy oats.  Well, _more_ oats.”  She’d made sure she and Sebastian would have their porridge.  And not to share with _horses_.  Ugh.  

 

Varric grunted and shifted his own over-stuffed satchel. “Not like you to travel heavy, though.”  

 

“Doesn’t hurt to be prepared in case we get side-tracked again.  I’m not interested in showing up on Cleve’s doorstep looking like half-starved vagrants.”  She glanced them over, all of their gear showing wear and tear and the slight pungency from over-worn clothing.   _Well, it could be worse.  “_ Wave to the nice Templars, everyone!  Let’s go, already.”

  
  
  


Sebastian kept his watch, as they left Tellend, and...ah.  In rear guard, he didn’t bother to conceal his smile as he watched Aeryn’s svelte figure swaying in front of him, the swing in her stride shortened just a bit as she trotted beside Varric.  She’d not been at such ease since they’d left Ferelden and her walk had become too economical and business-like.  The swing returning was yet another sign of her healing.    

 

Between them, he could hear Bethany chattering easily to Fenris and his low answers, their strides easily matched.  .   

 

He caught up to walk beside Aeryn once they’d left sight of the town.  He wanted to slide his hand into the small of her back, but it was an awkward way to walk outside of a casual stroll in a hall, not suited for the loping gait they were trying to maintain.  The winding trail climbed gently, leading them to Cleve’s borders and the small town of Prydin that sat at the foot of the bann’s modest keep, but it was hardly a lover’s path.  

 

Instead, he took her hand and she squeezed his fingers absently as she listened to Varric reporting on the gossip he’d picked up about the number of Templars heading to Kirkwall.  

 

Three abreast and two behind, they travelled companionably until the sun that had filtered through the oaks and elms all day hit the highest point it would climb that day just as they reached the first rocky hillock.  

 

They were looking for a reasonable camp when Aeryn caught the scent of decay on the wind.  “We probably should go back to that clearing a mile or so back, just past that abandoned wheat farm.  There’s something rotten...ah.  Well, sod.”  Cresting the hill, Aeryn picked out the odd splash of a crimson-booted foot sticking out from behind brown, dry bushes and a scrabbling sound as the scavengers that had started to gnaw on the corpse scattered.  A vulture squawked threateningly but drew itself up and flapped off as they continued to approach.

 

Not a random accident, there were signs of a fight; that the woman had been running , her leathers sweat-stained, mud-spattered and rent at the throat.  The chantry sun symbol embroidered on her tabard, declaring her an official messenger protected by all the might and mercy of the Chantry, was covered in dark blood.  

 

And, of course, there was the grotesque gaping smile at her throat.  Aeryn knelt beside her and looked carefully at the smooth cut, pulling one of her own blades and closing her eyes. Taller.  The killer had been taller, definitely.  Bethany, come here.”  She handed her sister the dagger and jerked her head, “Stand there and draw.”

 

“Alright.”  Bethany pulled back a few steps and held the dagger in a mimic of one of Aeryn’s practice moves.  “Like this?”

 

“Hmm.”  Aeryn stood in front of her, running the scene in her head.  The messenger was about two inches taller than she and the angle of the slice implied the killer was taller than Bethany and Fenris.  Not as tall as Sebastian, his elbow would be about three inches higher.  “Right, thanks.”  

 

Bethany handed her dagger back with a bemused smile.  “Anytime.”  

 

Fenris and Varric were scouting around the edges as the sisters worked.  “Two swordhands here.  Likely an archer across there.”  Fenris called.

 

Sebastian had climbed up to check out the look out a small hillock provided.  “Yes...but only as a lookout.  The weight on her feet says she didn’t fire.”  He disappeared, picking out an easier way down.  

 

Sitting back on her heels, Aeryn nodded and pulled the messenger’s pouch from under the body.  It was a gory mess, soaked through.  And empty.

 

“Well, that’s it.  Someone really didn’t want Tellend to get the aid they needed from Cleve.” Varric rubbed his chin.  “Unless, of course, the mothers are running jewels or lyrium instead of messages with their messengers.”

 

“Ugh.  No, let’s not complicate matters more than necessary.”

 

“I wish we had a couple more hands.  I’d like to send a couple of us back to Tellend, let them know about their messenger, but we need to get down the road.  I don’t want to split us with only one mage.”   She grimaced, thankful she’d chosen to wear gloves that morning as she rewrapped the thong around its fastening peg.  “Something I need you to do, Bethany.  Keep an eye out, see if we can come by another apostate.  We could use another mage in the mix.”

 

“You know we don’t wear glowing signs over our heads?”

 

Aeryn rolled her eyes at her sister, “Yes I do know that, bratling, but you might have a better chance of picking someone out than say, I would.”  

 

“You would trust a stranger?”  Fenris’ concern came out in grave tones.

 

“Not wholly...but you can’t deny that we were better balanced in Kirkwall, with two mages to draw on, a healer.  Not only that but…”

 

“There’s no circle in Starkhaven any longer but it is unlikely that mages have ceased to be born there and it is strange we have not heard more.”  Fenris finished her thought and Aeryn nodded.  

 

“ And a local mage is more likely to know what the story is, sure.”  Varric agreed

 

“More mages every year.”  Bethany murmured absently and when Aeryn cocked a curious look at her, explained.  “That’s what Orsino told me once.  That it seemed more and more mages were being born every year.  He had a few theories about it.”

 

Sebastian pushed out of the sparse undergrowth, plucking a greenbriar from his surcoat.  “We can be in Prydin by late tomorrow.  And back to Tellend by morning next if need be.” Leaning back to bend the branches of an alder out of the way, he pointed out a path, little more than a deer track.  “That is, if I recall it right, the overland track that the Dalish used most often. In days past.  It looks more recently travelled though.  And by heavier feet than Dalish are like to have.”

 

“Yes?”

 

“I’m fairly sure it runs parallel for a time.  I came that way when I returned to Kirkwall.”

 

“Why isn’t it the main way?”  Varric peered down the track, curiously.  It continued to climb gently and disappeared around the breast of the hill in the light that was beginning to tinge blue with afternoon shadow.

 

“It runs steep for a few miles and washes out in the spring. The rains won’t start for another month yet, though.  We should be safe enough and if that’s the way the bandits took, we might catch them up.”

 

“Unless this finer weather holds and the snow melts above us,” Fenris reminded him as he shaded his eyes to look up at the glinting peaks.  “I do not like the idea of letting a force proven to be killers run before us.”

 

“It’s not right to allow the sister to lie here unmourned, either.”  Sebastian countered.

 

Bethany nodded, agreeing. “I can send her on her way, but...it seems wrong to let her Chantry think she made her delivery.”

 

Aeryn glanced up to the mountain above them, following Fenris’ gaze, considering.  She rather agreed with Fenris, but Sebastian had that firmness to his chin that said he’d argue his point.

 

They could easily push and be back to Tellend by dark but there wasn’t anywhere to stay.  Camping might prove problematic.  They couldn’t insult the hospitality if they were invited to stay, again.  The sensible thing would be to split up.  Aeryn glanced at Bethany, showing only slight signs of tiredness from her broken night.  They couldn’t stay at the bloody Chantry.  And she didn’t want to leave her sister alone to deal with the demons, again.    _Sod it._  

 

“We have to go back, tell them what happened.  If someone from town comes across this corpse, they’re like to pin it on us. And while I don’t mind carrying her back to her Chantry for proper care, I don’t fancy hauling her across a mountain.”  Holding her hand up, she let Sebastian pull her to her feet. “Come on.  Split up and let’s find a few branches for a travois.  We can make it back to town before supper, if we hurry.”

 

They hastily assembled the carrying board, Varric lashing and tying the knots securely as the others held the frame in place.  Sebastian carefully lifted the body and Aeryn heard him whispering a quiet prayer over the mangled corpse as she and Fenris maneuvered the crosstied branches underneath.  She flipped open the canvas tarp she used under her tent and she and Bethany tucked it swiftly around the stiff, swelling limbs, thankfully cutting off most of the odor.  

 

And then they were done.  And she still hadn’t decided.  

 

“Hawke.”  Varric rumbled quietly, as he finished the note he’d been taking.  “This is not a good idea.”  

 

“Yeah, I know.”  

 

“What isn’t?”  Sebastian asked.

 

Aeryn laid her hand on his arm and he reflexively covered it with his own.  “If we go back to town, you’ll be asked to stay at the Chantry and since I asked Varric to start some rumors...someone might have pieced together who you are.  You’ll _have_ to stay to start cultivating that image as a conscientious prince of the realm.”

 

“And I can’t.”  Bethany realized.

 

Cutting her eyes to her sister, Aeryn nodded. “Not even for dinner, if I have my way.  Not with all those templars looking to practice.”

 

Fenris’ gruff voice was definite. “We must split up.”

 

“Yeah.”  Turning to Sebastian, she added, “I’ll come with you.  We’ll take her back.”  

 

“No.”

 

Sebastian winced at the hurt that flickered in her eyes and the tiny jerk of her fingers in his though there was no other reaction visible to their companions.  “I’ll be on my _best_ behavior, I promise.”  There was a theatrical flourish in her voice as though she was joking, but he didn’t fall to it.

 

“That’s not it at all.” He drew her to the side of the path, granite chips embedded in the crisp, dead grasses crunching and sliding under their feet.  “I’ll not do that to you, trap you somewhere bound to make you...uncomfortable.”

 

_Oh._  “You’ll be with me and...I’m pretty used to being uncomfortable in my surroundings, love.”  

 

His drawn brow told her what he thought of that. “And as much as I...as much as I might _wish_ I was enough to keep you from nightmares, we both know that isn’t true.”   His hand tightened around hers, the warm strength up her arm like he’d stroked her.    

 

And there was Bethany.  Who needed an eye kept out for her, needed a companion tonight.  Aeryn didn’t think her sister was quite ready to crawl into a bedroll with Fenris.  Not to mention, that wasn’t the best way to begin a relationship, “ _Hey, mind keeping me company so I don’t accidently become an abomination?_ ”   _Yes, let’s avoid_ that _._  

 

“Fenris, would you mind going back to town with Sebastian?”  Her partner glanced at Bethany first, and Aeryn gave him an out.  “Unless you want to, Varric. But I’d like to have Bianca if that lot ahead of us _does_ have an archer of their own and Sebastian and Fenris will travel fastest on the return tomorrow.”  

 

“No, it’s sensible that I go with Sebastian.”  Fenris agreed.  

 

“I think I can suffer the company of two deadly, beautiful Hawkes for an evening.”  Varric bowed to Fenris and Sebastian, a teasing glee in his rich voice.  “No hurry, serahs.”

 

“Sebastian and Fenris know the way, though.” Bethany said quietly almost under her breath and Aeryn frowned.  

 

“We’re just following the path.  I can manage to scout us, if necessary, you know.”

 

Bethany shook almost imperceptibly, as if a cold hand had brushed her neck but she gave her sister a wry smile.  “Just reminding you that we’ve never been here and they both have.  I’d rather not stumble around the woods in the dark on a “Dalish path” if I don’t have to.”  

 

Aeryn smirked at her sister’s arch tone.  “We’ll go a little farther along and camp before dark, I promise.”

 

“You used to say that about the trips up Sundermount, as I recall.”

 

“ _Once_. Once I made you march in the dark.”  

 

“ _I_ recall perhaps three times, Hawke.  When I was along.”  Fenris hid his amusement, adjusting his foot strap.

 

“Oh, it’ll be fine.” Varric falsettoed a comic mimic of Aeryn’s low voice.  “We’ll just take this little side trip and oh, hey, spiders!”  

 

Sebastian chuckled, “I’m beginning to be glad I didn’t join you until you gained a bit of…ah…”

 

“Common sense?” Bethany suggested.

 

“Caution.”  Sebastian moderated.  

 

Varric considered, “Actually now that I’ve been reminded, I think I’ll play escort with you, Charming.”  

 

“Too late, I’ve already claimed second.”  Fenris laughed as Aeryn folded her arms, huffing.  She elbowed her partner...mostly joking ...before Sebastian caught her, wrapping his arm around her shoulders and tucking her into his side.

 

“You’re all a riot.  I’m rolling, honestly,” she sniffed.  

 

“Just trying to keep you humble, Hawke.”  Varric shouldered Bianca and the extra pack with the men’s tent that Fenris handed over.  “You know I’d never leave you.”

 

“Yeah, yeah.  Flatterer.  Head for the top of the hill, I’ll be right there.”

 

“Give me a minute, please.”  Sebastian asked Fenris who raised his hand in acknowledgement as the archer guided Aeryn a few steps away.  

 

“Be _careful_.”  Her words were as much an admonishment as an acknowledgement of what he meant to say.

 

“I will, but I’m no’ the one heading towards a band of murderers.  Wait for us, _mo chridhe._  Don’t try and catch them without us.  We’ll leave soon as we can in the morning.”

 

“I’ll decide when and _if_ we catch them.  Unless they’re dawdling, I doubt we will but I won’t sit by and let them do any more damage if I can help it.”  But Bethany and Varric weren’t particularly fast travelers.  It was unlikely she’d be able to chivvy them along quickly enough to make any distance.  It was too bad...it would have been nice to cut through the woods and get ahead.  

 

Her face had shifted, her eyes locking on the short horizon, cool and calculating.  Already gone from him in all but body, she was thinking of the road ahead.  Hawke.  Sighing, Sebastian leaned over and brushed a kiss to her temple.  

 

Aeryn stroked her thumb across his cheekbone, drawn back to the clearing by the warmth of his lips.  “I love you.  Hurry back, alright?”

 

“As fast as I c’n manage it.  If we’re not invited to stay, I may turn back tonight.”  

 

The swat on his arm startled him.  “Don’t you _dare_.  If I think the two of you are scrabbling around the hills in the dark, I won’t...”  He stopped her scolding with his mouth on hers, her fingers clutching in the rich leather as she tried to hold him closer, his cool fingers slipping up to frame her jaw.  

 

Fenris had caught up with Bethany and then, found himself hesitating.  “Hawke is far less reckless than she used to be.  She won’t take a chance on getting you lost.”  He wondered if he sounded at all reassuring.

 

Bethany laughed, soft and sweet.  “It’s fun to tease her about it, though.  I missed that.”  She didn’t manage to hide a nervous glance up the mountain.  The trees were starting to loom, a little as the sun sank.

 

He’d asked that morning and gotten only a shrug.  Asking again felt almost nagging, but Fenris couldn’t help it.  “You are feeling well?”

 

Bethany ducked her head in a nod. “I think so.  I didn’t sleep as soundly as I would have liked, apparently.  I’ll drag my heels enough to make us camp early tonight.”   

 

Fenris flexed his chilled fingers and shot a quick look over his shoulder.  Hawke and Sebastian were deep in their farewells, Varric was starting up the steep incline that led to the next flattened pathway..  Steeling himself, Fenris reached out and took Bethany’s hand carefully. “I...we will return quickly.  I imagine Sebastian will not linger too long away.”  

 

Her hand turned in his and she tangled their fingers together with far less care of his taloned gauntlet.  “I’m glad.  Don’t let him drag you around, though.”  

 

“Perhaps I will drag _him_?”

 

“Oh.”  Leaning in, she pressed a small kiss just in front of his ear.  This close, she could almost smell the crisp acridity of lyrium and feel sudden heat flushing his cheek.  “Be safe.”

 

Just ahead, Varric shook his head and muttered.  “Lovebirds.  Bianca, we’re surrounded by lover’s sighs.”  He rubbed the rich golden stock with the tips of his fingers, soothingly and chuckled.  It could be worse.  They could be...

 

Well, shit.  He’d just jinxed them, hadn’t he?  

  
  


 

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


  



	32. Chapter 32

Fenris and Sebastian had made the trip back in only three hours, despite their grim and silent   
companion. They switched lead once, Sebastian pulling the travois while Fenris walked guard. 

 

Aeryn had a strict rule about how fast they travelled, geared to eke stamina out of Varric and Bethany neither of whom walked as quickly as the rest of them. She measured it in her head, a trick learned while marching with Cailan’s Army, and kept point to keep the pace steady. There were no such constraints on Sebastian and Fenris, though, and time was of the essence to make it back to town before any scavengers decided to take them up on their offering. 

 

Agreeing, they skirted the busy market to reach the Chantry but in the extra minutes they took, some unseen messenger caught and passed them. When they arrived at the wide porch of the stone chapel, there was a gathering of Sisters and Templars standing stoically, while a cloud of townspeople whispered behind their hands and stared. 

 

Fenris eyed the crowd uneasily and Sebastian gathered himself and stepped in front at the wide steps up to the building before the small crowd. The Chantry and townsfolk parted to let the Revered Mother through, the old woman’s face stiff and silent when Sebastian bowed to her.

 

With slow steps, Maris knelt carefully beside the travois and unwrapped the canvas to look upon her aide’s darkened face, grief etching lines around her eyes as she murmured her prayer. She finished with, “And now she’ll rest at the Maker’s side, His faithful servant.”

 

Sebastian noticed that Fenris spoke, “So let it be” along with the rest of the gathered. When the moment of silence ended, he offered his hand and drew the Mother to her feet.

 

Maris cleared her face of emotion in a way that Sebastian found rather startlingly familiar as the Knight-Captain joined them. The soldier tucked her helmet under her arm and asked, with a steely undertone to her warm voice, “Who did this vicious thing?”

 

“A group of bandits. My betrothed and our companions are following, with some hope of catching the murderers, Your Reverence.”

 

“You need some reward, then? You and your mercenaries?”

 

Sebastian’s back straightened and he raised his chin to take the brunt of the hard words. He regarded the old woman for a moment down the bridge of his nose and Fenris wondered if the archer intended to cow the Mother but Sebastian’s response was respectful and if it was a contrast perhaps it was only in the natural grace. “No, Your Reverence. We meant only to return her body to allow you to prepare it for cremation and to ask if you had another set of documents to take to Cleve.”

 

“As I recall, you wanted that task yourself.” The templar they had spoken to before snapped out the accusatory observation and Fenris glanced behind him. It was a clean dash, he thought, to the tree line if this went even farther downhill. But there were archers among the contingent. They would not make it. 

 

“We wished to be of service and went out of our way and endangered ourselves to do it. If we are treading unwelcome, then we shall leave and you shall not see us again.” Now came a colder tone and Fenris let a smile curve in the shadow of his hood. The prince had paid good attention to lessons past. 

 

Maris shook her head, “No. No. Forgive us. Step down, Ser Asher.” The knight across the way nodded to the Mother and unnocked his arrow before he stepped back with a slight bow.

 

“You have my thanks, you and your friends. Forgive us,” she asked in a weary, contrite tone. “Murder is uncommon here and to have such upsetting things in succession has disarranged us. Please, you cannot decline our offer of hospitality tonight.” As she waved her thin hand, directing them to the doors, a lay brother and a templar came to take away the body.

 

Sebastian cocked his head at Fenris, in query, and Fenris gave him a small nod. They followed Maris’ direction and went inside.

 

They were shown to a small plainly furnished washroom to clean up and the laybrother who’d taken away the body returned to make an offer of clean robes. When Sebastian pulled the fustian garment over his head and turned around, he found Fenris regarding him curiously.  
“Your betrothed?” Fenris raised his eyebrow and Sebastian had to laugh and shake his head.

 

“She’ll forgive me a small…simplification.”

 

“Just making sure I hadn’t missed anything.” Fenris adjusted his belt around his waist and frowned down at the result, plucking the material away from the sensitive tattoos on his chest. “This fits...unpleasantly.” 

 

“It’s meant to make you feel at one with the company.” Sebastian knotted his own belt and tugged it to the side so that the length would fall and not bank against his knee. 

 

“I do not think I blend, even so. “ 

 

He gave Sebastian a nod and followed him into the dining hall.

 

Sister Odette sent Sebastian a small smile as she toted a soup tureen to the farthest of three low, broad pine tables that lined the stuccoed room, plain except for a fresco on the far wall of Andraste leading an army to the edge of the Minanter. A scent of browned onions, fresh bread, and stewed greens filled the air appetizingly as they were seated at Maris’ table, just a few places down from the Mother. 

 

The room was quiet, the normal chatter of an evening gathering after a long day of work muted by the death of one of their own. Maris stood to give the blessing as the light faded outside the windows tucked under the raftered ceiling.

 

The soup, lentils and kale sweetened with carrot in hearty broth, was served with rye bread sliced into thin strips and toasted with cheese. It was a tasty, surprisingly satisfying meal after a long march in chilly air. 

 

Stewed fruit over broken honey cakes followed and in the warm companionship that followed the meal, Sebastian felt more comfortable breaking the silence that had hovered over the table, broken only by requests for the bread or salt to be passed.

 

“I have a question for you, Ser Linda.”

 

She sat aside the small pitcher of hard sauce she’d been dribbling over her dessert and focused on Sebastian. “I’ll do my best to answer, messere.” 

 

Fenris watched Sebastian’s face but there was no indication that the man had noted the uplift in how the Templar had addressed him when he asked, “While we greatly appreciate the Chantry’s hospitality, I wonder at the necessity. Why does a market town like Tellend have only the one inn?”  
“Ah...that’s easy enough. We’ve only been a market town these last five years or so. There’s always been a small gathering monthly...but the full market has only been in service since then.”

 

“Why the change?” Fenris asked, curious.

Ser Linda grimaced, “It’s not safe any longer to travel all the way to Chastain or even Prydin every month. Maris and the mayor have tried to ignore it, to say that they’ve encourage the market to grow Tellend’s influence, but.” She paused before she continued in a quieter voice. “The honest truth is that the roads are no longer safe. As Sister Cathris found.”

 

She lifted her long chin towards the outbuilding that sheltered the pyre. “She’s the first official to die but not the first of the commoners. And we’ve stepped up patrols, we’ve neglected our official duties and done little good, in any route. Bandits travel off the roads, they can split up and regroup without drawing too much notice.” Glancing down at the plate, Ser Linda added, “We Templars...we aren’t a subtle force, you see.”

 

Sebastian nodded grimly, “No, it’s not your strong point. And you’ve not sent for aid from Cleve because?”

 

“We have. Only to be told that the bann’s forces are being used to patrol in the north. Besides bandits, there are stories of Qunari and Tevinter raiders. Slavers, even.” 

 

Fenris frowned across the table, but Sebastian curled his fingers in one of Aeryn’s small signals. They hadn’t yet mentioned their connection with the bann. Fenris spoke anyway, with only a slight hesitation. “That would explain their reluctance to divide forces. We have some experience with slavers and Qunari,” he added when the Captain looked curious. 

 

“And what would the Vael heir have to do with slavers and Qunari?”

 

Sebastian failed to swallow his surprise and he could feel tension…well, perhaps menace was the better word, radiating from Fenris, the elf’s eyes narrowing dangerously. Aeryn had mentioned in passing that she’d begun planting seeds…but surely she hadn’t announced him without his knowledge. “What makes you think that, Ser Linda?”

 

Her own casual posture didn’t change even as she levelly met Fenris’ gaze before answering Sebastian. “Rumors spread quickly in the countryside. And I met you once very briefly when you served the Grand Cleric, Maker rest her fine soul. In Cumberland, when I was given this charge. The rumors Sister Odette brought back from the tavern jarred the memory.” 

 

Sebastian cast his thoughts back, but he’d met many on that particular journey. The spires, sights and smells of the Nevarran port city and the whirl of acting as Elthina’s secretary had filled his time. “I apologize. I was rather overwhelmed. Cumberland was my first trip away from Kirkwall in many years.”

 

“And yet here you are and no longer a humble brother.”

 

“I left the Chantry not long after that. I attempted to make restitution.” And so he had, in all but body. 

 

“And you only return home now?”

 

“I’m going to be married, you see.” Sebastian stopped himself from bouncing his toes under the table. He’d said it twice in as many days...he should probably actually ask, at some point. 

 

“The young woman with dark hair?” 

 

“No. The woman who came with me to deliver the coin we took from the bandits.”

 

“Ah.” Ser Linda seemed to be trying to recall Aeryn’s face. “Oh, the fierce little knife that stood your second when I met you on the road?”

 

“Yes, that’s she. Though it must be said, she stands second to none among us.”

 

Ser Linda eyed him over. “She…didn’t look to be…noble.”

 

Fenris coughed a laugh. “She’ll be glad to hear she was less than memorable.”

 

Sebastian couldn’t help the smile and Linda’s thin brows rose as she looked between them. “A private joke?”

 

“You’d have to know our Aeryn to understand it I’m afraid, Captain. She’s…”

 

“Shy, then?”

 

“Private.” 

 

“Fat lot of good that’ll do her in the courts of Orlais should you have need to go there. They’ll eat her.”

 

“You’d be surprised at the tough mouthful she’d make.”

 

“May it be so.” With a nod, she ended their private conversation, “Excuse me, gentlemen.” Ser Linda stood and grinned at them when they stood as well. “I’ve got troops to tuck in for the night.” In a sharp, carrying voice she barked, “Quarters.” The other Templars pushed away from their table and followed her out.

 

After the meal, Fenris and Sebastian were shown to their quarters for the night. The room was hidden in shadows, the light coming mainly from the small fireplace on the far wall. Two simple chairs flanked the table close by, and Sister Odette hurried to light the candle set in a painted pottery dish. Quietly they made their preparations for bed, silently agreed to make an early night and set out at dawn.

 

0000000000000

 

The chime of bells, the sonorous Chant lifting with the rising sun.

 

Dawn-break at the Chantry was a routine laid in his bones after years of service.

 

He was late…he’d been assigned kitchen duty. Mother Louise would rap his knuckles bloody if he didn’t hurry.

 

Muddling into half-consciousness as he pushed himself to the edge of the narrow cot, his feet hitting the floor and its hooked mat rug, Sebastian heard the fading sound of the bells as other things intruded on his senses. The waft of faint incense. The bland warm smell of porridge and a spikier one of potato and onion. The scratch of his coarse spun robe across his shoulders and the heavy linen sheet beneath his fingers smelling of lye and southernwood.

 

Still half asleep, grief tightened his throat and weakened his knees, forcing him back down. Oh, Andraste. He couldn’t couldn’t have been dreaming so long. All of it only a cruel trick of the changeable Fade. “Aeryn…” His fingers curled, the nails cutting into his palm even as he looked around and felt a jarring dislocation. Not even a lingering whisper of her almond scented soap to comfort him before morning prayers.

 

“Sebastian? Are you well?” The concerned voice came gruffly from across the dimly lit room.  
He jerked his head around to see Fenris, the white hair spiky and mussed with sleep as he pressed up on his elbows, across from Sebastian on another cot and the elf’s dark brows drawn as he looked around for what might have yanked his roommate from what had seemed a sound sleep, to make such a mournful whisper.

 

“OH. Ah, Fenris!” After a moment of disbelief, he whispered prayerfully, “Thank the Maker.” Reality and memory rushed back in on him, burning off the last vestiges of a dream.

 

Fenris had to chuckle at the open, bewildered relief on Sebastian’s features before the archer dropped his head into his hands and scrubbed at his eyes with the palms, laughing ruefully.

“Good morning. It seems you’ve picked up Hawke’s habit…and style…of early rising.” Sarcasm dripped from his companion as he too, swung out of bed and winced at the cool floor despite the thoughtfully placed rug.

 

Eyes cleared of sleep, now. Sebastian glanced around him. The guest quarters were, in reality, entirely unlike the cramped cell that had been his in Kirkwall. The creamy stone walls were built into arches that opened up the small space. There was another room off to the side for private uses and well built, polished table and chairs for meals and work. Two beds made up with beautifully block printed and quilted blankets, the frames in golden oak to match the table. A broad fireplace glowing with banked ash beyond the granite hearth and two braziers ensured the room was warm despite the window beyond them showing a bleak day.

 

“Not entirely. I just…I was apparently dreaming I was still in the Chantry. It was a startling to wake and find myself…” He waved at himself in the plain robe and the room, smiling wanly.

 

“Yes.” Fenris nodded, “I would imagine so.” He had some acquaintance with the disorientation of false dreams and left Sebastian to gather himself while he went to relieve certain pressing matters. The water in the pitcher was chilled when he washed his face and he couldn’t help but miss Bethany’s knack with keeping water warm. He watched his reflection shaking its head in the mirror.

 

When he returned, Sebastian had opened the door to their room and discovered the neatly folded clothing in a basket. He took his turn in the facilities while Fenris dressed.

 

A few minutes later, Fenris heard a half swallowed blaspheme and shook his head again when the archer emerged, toweling his wet hair dry.

 

“That may have been a mistake. The weather looks less accommodating than it was yesterday.” Fenris nodded out to the clouds gathering, low on the horizon. Dark and flat bottomed, they spoke of snow in the heights.

 

“Needed to clear my head. It’ll dry fast enough.” Though Aeryn was right, he was fair overdue a haircut. Sebastian pulled his tunic, a particularly nice one in thick, sooty charcoal wool. He’d chosen to carry it over the others on their journey because of its warmth and the dark color that would hide stains, but also because it was one of those Aeryn had stitched up herself, adorning it with a tiny pattern of embroidered arrows lining the placket that she’d dallied over while they were aboard ship. It was an indulgent thing, but he felt altogether happier once the rich, fine spun cloth was surrounding him, the robe abandoned (though neatly folded from long habit) on the bed. It smelled of southernwood and smoke as well, from hanging near a fire to dry instead of almonds or the orris root she and Orana had used in Kirkwall, but even so it was as if Sebastian felt a small steady hand over his heart as he laced it closed. He tucked the long shirt tail into his breeches, lacing them as well, and began the process of strapping into his armor, smiling a little at his fancy.

 

000000000

 

The hall was empty, arched brick ceilings echoing back even their light steps as the two walked down to the dining hall, towards the wafting smells of tea and food. Platters of cold meats and cheese joined the porridge and potatoes steaming in wooden bowls.

 

The pine tables were unattended. “We’re early, it seems.” 

 

Sebastian stopped in the doorway and looked back down the hall to where it turned into the narthex. The shock he’d woken to had lingered, and a bit of meditation might not go amiss. “I’m going into prayer. If I sit at the back, I shouldn’t interrupt.”

 

Fenris hesitated, recalling their agreement last night to leave quickly before he shrugged, “I will come.” He appreciated that Sebastian did not so much as lift a curious brow before the archer turned on his heel and strode towards the lifting sound of voices in unison. One day soon, he would have to sit down with his friend and discuss…more serious matters. He wanted some common ground before he breached such ideas with Bethany. 

 

They hurried and slipped into the service, just as the sung Chant ended and Mavis began the morning ritual of adding a new cone of incense to the heavy bronze and glass brazier hanging from the statue of the Beloved’s hands. 

 

Andraste’s likeness was carved from wood and gilded with her face turned up and her mouth slightly open as if she’d only stopped singing to take a breath. Sebastian hid a reminiscent smile as he kneeled. The statue in the Starkhaven Chantry was a similar pose, though made of stone.  
Far less dour than Kirkwall’s version had been. The stern figure that had held court over the Kirkwall Chantry had matched the grim architecture and the bleak outlook of her populace and he’d long wondered if that crowned statue had been repurposed, just as the building that had housed Her. He’d never found reference to a female Tevene deity, among the dragons they’d revered. Shaking his head, Sebastian drew his focus back to the service.

 

With the incense replaced and a simple reading of the weekly message from the Divine...like as not two or three weeks behind times, the service ended with the lifting of the Chantor’s voice leading the worshippers, Chantry folk all at this early hour just past dawn, in a verse of Trials and an announcement that Sister Cathris’ ashes were to be returned to the earth on the morrow. 

 

They breakfasted in near silence, a custom of the Chantry that had been observed in Kirkwall only on feast days. Mother Maris had a new fair copy of the letters she needed Bann Cleve to see bundled into a packet with a fresh wax seal emblazoned in gleaming red wax. She offered them medals of the Chantry, to mark them as official messengers. Fenris took his reluctantly and tucked it into the small pocket in his vest. Sebastian dangled his for a moment before he dropped it around his neck and bowed to the old woman. “I have sworn in the past to be a servant of the Maker.”   
“Then continue to do so with our thanks, Sebastian Vael.”

 

He felt the movement as Fenris tensed behind him, ever conscious of danger, but Sebastian only nodded. “I would welcome your blessing on our journey, as well, Revered Mother.”

 

She regarded him for a moment with a solemn expression in her faded brown eyes. And then with a tightening of her mouth, she tipped her head and raised her hand, waiting while Sebastian knelt and after a hesitation, Fenris followed. “And so shall you have it. Maker’s Blessing upon you, Sebastian Vael, Fenris, and upon your companions. May your journey be a continuation of your service and may your path bend ever towards the Beloved’s Words.”

 

She finished with a flourish and they spoke their thanks before rising to their feet. “We meant to be gone far earlier, I’m afraid.”

 

“The weather will hold for you until the late afternoon, I should think.” Maris looked at the clouds hanging over the hills. “But you’ll meet snow when you cross the height.”

 

“All the more reason to continue on quickly, before our companions begin to worry.”

 

“After Ferelden, I doubt a small storm will slow us.” 

 

Fenris said it lightly enough, but Sebastian heard the grumbled undertone. He was right, too. They should have left immediately upon waking. He shouldered his pack, adjusted the strap across his chestplate and checked the quiver at his hip. 

 

“Come then, my friend.” 

 

Maris was right. The snow held off until they were halfway up the mountain pass, cut through in long ago days…long enough that the visible signs of the magic that had done the work were long since obscured with weathering of the brown granite. The early nudge of spring could be seen in the cracks of the stone, tiny root systems beginning to unfurl curls of green to reach the light. But the snow seemed like to deny them a bit longer.

 

The flakes fell thinly at first, crisp and small. Within another hour’s climb, though, the snow had become heavy and wet, clinging to their cloaks and weighting their steps. Sebastian glanced behind him to see that Fenris had pulled the dark green hood of his cloak low on his forehead. He couldn’t help but be thankful that the Ferelden predilection for fur trim and Aeryn’s foresight in choosing thick waulked wool made for a warm outer layer.

 

They ate as they journeyed, leaving the shelter of the pass. There had been no sign of Aeryn, Bethany, and Varric until just past the carved out egress. Fenris beelined towards a small stack of piled stones and knocked off the top two, showing Sebastian a neat square of dark red leather, etched with a small ‘H.’ “Hawke.” He explained shortly, handing the scrap to Sebastian before he scattered the stones in a more natural pattern with his foot. 

 

“You’re sure?” He’d half hoped they’d catch the other half of their group, but the ice formed around the stones before Fenris disturbed them spoke of an overnight snow and thaw before the temperature had dropped again.

 

“It’s a system we worked out in the Deep Roads, scouting for Varric’s brother. Square is “all clear,” round is “battle, area clear.” If they were in danger, or pursuit, the rocks would not have been stacked, just laid into a triangle. We used it again in Orlais when we were forced to separate, but you were not with us, then.”

 

“No.” 

 

As they continued, the hazy light dimming quickly, occasionally one of the ice laden pines growing over the road would pop and drop a crashing brittle branch. The plummeting ice and snow was only a drenching, though frigid annoyance. The branches themselves were hazardous and more than once, Sebastian had to duck aside quickly, yanking Fenris along with him. 

 

After he’d knocked them both over a second time and Fenris was dusting himself off, Sebastian asked, “Should we chance further, do you think?”

 

“We’ve little choice.” The dying light reflected in Fenris’ irises as he scanned the horizon. “There is no cover that I can see, without leaving the path.” 

 

“And we don’t want to do that.” Sebastian agreed. He tried to disguise a glance at the elf’s feet by shaking the ice out of the fur on his hood. Aeryn never had convinced her partner to bring the boots she’d commissioned with his new armor. As far as he knew, Fenris might have left them in his trunk on the boat. The elf shifted from foot to foot and his steps had become slower as the snow accumulated as they left the lea of the mountain to traverse the downward slope. 

 

Straightening his back, he shuddered as icy water slipped down his collar, having forced its way through the wool hood. His leathers were damp and he realized it had begun to sap his energy, shivering against the chill. 

 

Fenris was looking at him oddly. “You have ice in your eyebrows.” He finally said and slumped. “We must camp, as much as I would rather press on.”

 

“Next flat bit we find,” Sebastian agreed.

 

They slid as much as walked down the stone and gravel path for the next half mile. Sebastian was about to call a halt anyway as the muscles in his thighs began to protest when through thickening snow, he saw a tall, dark bulk against the lavender grey of the skyline. “Fenris, d’ya see that or am I seeing things?”

 

Fenris peered forward. “A tower?”

 

“I think?”

 

“Make for it. We can at least pitch camp on the lea side.”

 

It was farther than it seemed, or else the growing wind was pressing them back, but eventually the Martello loomed over them. They began circling, noting the crumbling mortar and the clear signs of age. But they found an ancient, massive wooden door hanging from the remnant of strap hinges. Fenris leaned into it and between them, they managed to drag it open. 

 

They didn’t seem to have attracted unwanted attention, but the elf held up a hand and loosed the strap holding his broadsword. Sebastian took the hint and nocked an arrow. Fenris allowed his tattoos to flare and throw light and stepped inside.

 

It was musty and dank, but nearly dry; the floor littered with the detritus of dead plants that had grown on blown in dirt, feathers, and a few small bones, long bare. The tower was barely twenty feet across and wind blew in through the broken chinking of the ancient masonry but it was unoccupied but for the low rustling of birds in high rafters, unseen above them. 

 

Sebastian lowered his bow, feeling the release of tension across his shoulders. “Better in than out, then. Thank the Maker.”

 

“Yes. Though I would mind your step.” Fenris grumbled. 

 

“We’ll lay down the tarps.” Sebastian assured him, hiding a smile. “And pitch the tents over our heads.”


	33. Chapter 33

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stabbing and shopping

There was snow in the air, Aeryn could smell it as she, Varric and Bethany descended from the peak.  Blast.  She glanced over her shoulder at the pass, now a good half mile behind them.

“There’s a tower up ahead.  Did Fenris or Sebastian say anything to you about a manned defense along the road?

She shook her head.  “He mentioned there were a few ruins from the Third Blight, but there aren’t any waystations.”

Varric stopped to wedge a pebble out of his shoe with the tip of his belt knife.  “Maker forbid there be any actual civilization for us to be distracted by.”

“I promise all the civilized company you can handle, from here on out.  Like as not, this is our last stretch of roughing it, unless the campaign takes us out farther than I expect it will.”

“There’s civil and then there’s civility, Hawke.”

“Free flowing ale, fine company, and the softest beds coin can gain, I swear.”

“I’ll hold you to it, but you’ve always been a liar.”

“Oh, I’m wounded!”  She slapped a hand over her heart and tried to ignore the way the clouds behind them gathered.

“Aeryn…”  Bethany’s light laugh went thin snapping Aeryn’s attention to her sister, standing just apart from the two rogues.  Bethany’s eye was on a bloody smear across a pale outcropping of stone, just off the trail.  Dried and brown but fresh enough that last night’s mist hadn’t streaked it.

Could be an animal…someone took a shot and missed.”  Varric said.  But he tipped his head to the left.  There were scraps of bloody cloth torn and left to the far side.  The sister must have gotten in a stab.  Good on her.  The odds of the bandits lingering were slim, but just in case they’d best be wary.

“Yeah, at that height it’s probably a deer. Quiet feet, shall we?  Might catch up to it.”

Bethany nodded, adding in a frivolous giggle at contrast with her serious eyes. “Oh, I’d like to have venison for dinner.”

“Steak all ‘round, then.”  Varric was muffling his laugh at Bethany’s playacting and Aeryn cuffed him on the shoulder.  “Let’s get going.”

Aeryn kept her eyes to the trail, dropping in an aside now and again as her companions kept up their banter.  The ground was heavily trampled about a hundred yards farther along, and it was clear whoever it was had begun to drag their injured companion.

Not far though.  The corpse was fresh and cooling, a thickset fellow with the hands of a swordsman.  They’d taken the weapon and his helm, his greying hair long and matted with the blood that had streamed from his mouth and nose.  The sister had gotten him in the lung, probably nicked a bit of stomach, looking at the way he’d swollen.

No sense in keeping up the pretense now.  “Found our deer.  No steaks, I’m afraid.”

“Eugh.  Well, I never really liked venison anyway.”  Bethany wrinkled her nose.

There were sliding footprints down the slope of the mountain side and Aeryn padded carefully over, her hand on the throwing knife at her waist and then nodded to Varric and Bethany to follow her.

Varric lifted Bianca from her shoulder harness and casually loaded a bolt.  There was the bare hiss of the sliding mechanism and Aeryn saw a movement in the icy cedar branches that crowded the path forward.

Behind her, Aeryn felt the familiar buzz of Bethany plying her mana.  She flicked her fingers out, asking her sister for one of the dragging force spells the younger woman had perfected at the Gallows.

She just barely ducked aside as an arrow seared past her right ear, dropping into shadows as she rolled.  Bethany yanked the archer into the clearing, driving her into the stone that the corpse had fallen against, as well as a woman trying to dig her blade into the ground to slow the pull.

“Hawke!  There’s another pair…” the ratchet of Bianca retorted twice in the meadow, and a thud of bolt meeting flesh.  “Blast, missed the other, ah thanks Sunshine.” As ice formed below the man’s feet and sent him sliding.

Aeryn left them to their pair of opponents as she circled around the staggering warrior.  She had a height and reach advantage and Aeryn expected the woman outweighed her by a good three stone.  But none of that saved her from the flash bomb and a backstab, angled up through the neck.  

One of the dragonbone blades was deflected by the chain she wore, but the other ripped satisfyingly through a tendon and arterial blood sprayed across the blue green cedar.

 Leaping backwards, Aeryn avoided the spiked iron gauntlet swung into the space her ribs had occupied and waited as the warrior dropped to her knees and fell face first into the frozen dirt of the path.

She let the slope of the hill pull her over into a flip that landed her closer to the archer but Bethany’s spell had forced her into the rock at a fatal angle.   Across the clearing, a neatly placed fireball scattered another archer and a dual wielder directly into Varric’s path.

“We flushed another one, he got down the hill!”  Bethany called out, sending Aeryn full tilt down the dirt road before she slid to a halt as it took a turn a few meters on.  Pulling shadows to her, she stepped into the low vegetation that would hide her steps.

A scent of acrid green spice flooded the air and before Aeryn could stop herself she’d sucked in a lungful that sent her hacking uncontrollably.  Throwing herself backwards, to the safety of the dirt she could hear a low chuckle just beyond her and skittering footsteps.   The flick of her wrist as she rolled over was almost an involuntary response.  A following squawk told her she’d hit something.

The throwing blade wasn’t poisoned though.  Gravel clattered and her opponent grunted and ran off as she continued to clear her lungs with heaving coughs.  That one was getting away.

Bethany and Varric came running up and Aeryn sat on her heels, breathing hard.  “Watch the greenery, it’s…. _huff_ …potent.”

“Should we follow?”

“He knows the area and we don’t,”  she shrugged with a final deep sigh.  “With dark coming on, we’d be better off waiting.  I hit him, but I don’t think it was anything fatal.”

“Are you alright?”

Aeryn waved her sister’s concern off.  “Yeah.  Either of you have a torch to light?  I want a look at this stuff.”

The dying sunlight and Varric’s torch revealed the roadside’s natural trap.  It was a small, ground-hugging plant with tiny fleshy, pale green leaves laid sparse on a reddish stem.  Carefully, Aeryn crushed one small leaf at arms’ length.   Even so, the pungency made her sneeze, again.

Covering her mouth with the scarf she’d been using to keep her head warm beneath her hood, she scythed a few handfuls into a pouch and carefully folded it into the bottom of her rucksack.  “That’s going to come in useful, somewhere down the road.”

“If you say so.”  Varric had his hand covering his nose.  “Shit, it smells like…”

“Like I’ve rolled in it?”

“I’m afraid so?”  Bethany laughed, backing away.

“Think I did, actually, trying to get out of it.”  Aeryn brushed the green remnants from her knees and pushed the kerchief down to her neck.  “Void.  Hopefully we’ll find a stream before we hit town.”

Varric poked her gingerly in the back with Bianca’s stock.  “I think I’ll take point, Hawke.  You stay downwind.”

“Wait, let’s check them over and go.  I don’t particularly want to camp next to our companions, but we need to get those paper to show to Cleve if we can.”

Unfortunately, there was no sign of the papers that the bandits had stolen from the sister they’d murdered.  “What are the odds they were on that slippery one?”  Aeryn asked as she patted down the archer’s padded jerkin.

“Could be.  Or they might have been a larger group…what’s the matter?”

Aeryn had sat back on her heels staring at a small item she’d pulled from a hidden pocket.

“Does this look familiar?”  She showed them a small stone marker held out on her open palm.

“It looks…Aeryn, that looks awfully like the magister’s mark that the girl in Ferelden had.”

“Yeah, it does.”  She dropped it into a pocket on her trousers.  “I’ll show it to Fenris and make sure.”

“Why would magisters hire mercenaries to rob a Chantry sister?”

“More like, why would they care that a little town in the Marches sent word to their bann?”

“I can’t imagine.”

“Whatever it is, can’t be good.   Come on.  Let’s get down the road.  The moon’s up.  I won’t make us walk all night, but…”

“We need to get to Cleve.” Varric said gravely.

 

The dawn came bright and clear, and found them on the path again.  They’d only put up one tent and taken an hour shift each for watch, giving them all about three hours to rest their feet.  Varric took one look at Aeryn’s drawn face as she doused their fire and bit back the sarcastic bite about “luxury” that had been on the tip of his tongue.  She stacked another pile of rocks for Fenris to gauge from while Bethany finished her tea and they set off.

Four hours later, they were within sight of Priden’s walls as the road sloped down to the town.  A slender branch of the river curved through banks that were already greening despite the chilly weather.

“Thank the Maker.”  Bethany sighed.

“Hmm.”  Aeryn grunted.  She’d like to complain herself but she was reserving energy for the meeting with Cleve’s seneschal.  It was unlikely the bann himself had made it home already.  Varric had his fair copy of the letter of introduction that Cleve had sent with Sebastian, but the first impression would be hers.  And she was just this side of wrecked.  Maybe just a step or two the other side.  She fought off a shiver.

The Keep was on a rise inside the walls, the glimmer of warm golden stone and its broad dark flags with their copper insignia were easy to spy as was the Chantry just a couple of city blocks past it down the river.  There were guards on the city gate, but the two Aeryn spied as the companions approached weren’t making any effort to block the light flow of travelers into and out of Priden.  Now and again they’d casually make a note of someone and she could see light footed runners in the city’s livery dashing out and back again.

No runner for them, she noticed, though when she glanced up the taller of the guards was making a note of them.  There was no open board of notice here, no way for her to tell if Hawke was a known name or not.

The promise Sebastian had drawn from her gritted across Aeryn’s sense of safety.   _But you did promise_ , she reminded herself as she resisted an urge to tug her hood farther down her nose.    

Bethany watched a brightly painted cart maneuver through the crowded main street before she exclaimed, “It’s so much bigger than I’d expected!”

Aeryn drew herself up to grin, “And me.  Though, Fenris mentioned something about a theatre hall, you know.  So it had to be reasonably sized.”

“Really?”  Bethany obviously swallowed back an eager question of attending, the early morning sunshine brightening her eyes, and Aeryn felt the tautness in her shoulders lighten.

“We’ll probably have a good while here, waiting for Cleve and our things” she assured the younger woman.

“It’s not very impressive.”  Varric grumped.

“Well, there’s no giant statues dedicated to misery and pain standing about, it’s true.  But look, a tavern without drunks piled outside!”  Bethany elbowed the dwarf and he laughed.  

“After seeing what they could do, I’ll take the tavern, unadorned though it might be.”

“Not just yet.  Let’s see about the Bann.”

The Keep set at the center of the city and they soon found themselves at a newly built entrance, the stone’s chiselmarks still sharp and lingering stone dust still in the cracks.  A bright faced young woman in finely bronzed armor greeted them.  “Welcome travelers!”

“We’ve a letter of introduction for the Bann’s seneschal.”  Aeryn held it out and after a cursory glance, the guardswoman waved it back.

“Lady Zenna is holding court this morning, attending to the needs of her father’s people.   However, there are no arms allowed inside the Keep, barring those of the guards, Messere.  You and your companions will have to disarm.”  She indicated a wall of hooks and bars, already bearing an assortment of blades.

Varric slung Bianca off his shoulder.  “Would you mind setting Bianca inside?  She doesn’t care for mixing with the common sort, too much.”

The guardswoman took the ornate crossbow with wide eyes.  “Uh, yes of course, messere.”  Aeryn placed her gleaming dragonbone blades on top of the guard’s counter.

“Just to keep the lady company.”

“Do they have names as well?” she asked, apprehensively as Aeryn placed her most obvious throwing knife on the counter.

“Not that you can say in mixed company, guardswoman.”  Varric answered her with a gleam in his eye and a josh to his voice that made her laugh.

Bethany leaned her staff carefully against the guardhouse wall.  “Might as well keep everything together, then.”

“We’ll keep them safe.  There’s a break fast in the greeting hall through that set of doors.   And a wash up just over there.  If you’ve a mind, messeres.”  That was added in a rush as if she hesitated to insult them, but Aeryn gave her a wave and Varric and Bethany smiled as they went to attend to their dirt.

There were a dozen folk of varying backgrounds milling in the hall, and a few that looked to be court officials judging from the badges and chains of office at their neck.  All were dressed fit for mingling with nobles and despite her own unease, Aeryn shrugged when Bethany fussed over their own stained attire.

“Can’t be helped.  It’s not as if we have anything better, just yet.  Surely the woman won’t hold our travels against us.”

They drew interested gazes, as strangers in the midst.  Aeryn set her chin high and Varric and Bethany fell in to flank her as they walked to the table spread with pastries, small savories and a steaming kettle with warmed wine.

“Lady Zenna, daughter and regent to the Bann.”  Aeryn sat aside the egg coddled in flaky crust she’d only taken a small bite of as a tall, sturdily built woman strode in.  Her rich brown hair was plaited in neat buns behind her head and she was dressed in a metal and leather corset made to resemble armor, laced over a dark green gown chased with a stylized pattern in a lighter shade.

She greeted the people as she passed them, listening intently with large, beautiful dark blue eyes locked on their faces and often leaving them with a pat of her long-fingered square hand.

Finally, she was in front of Aeryn who dropped a curtsey, just low enough to be taken as offered respect.  “You are not from  Priden, I think?”  Her voice bore a trace of Orlesian, different from her father’s slight hint of Starkhaven.

“No, Lady.  We’re travelling from Ferelden where we met your father.”  Varric handed the letter over this time, stepping into his role as herald.

“I hope you found him well.  Is he returning so…”  Her eyes stopped on the names listed and then narrowed as she snapped her head up.   “Sebastian Vael.  I do not see any Vaels among you.”

“No, he was detained by an incident just after we left Tallend.  He’ll be joining us as he can.”

“Detained, yes.  I’m sure.  Was he drunk?  He usually was.”

Aeryn answered this time, a crisp edge to her voice.  “No.  We came across a death and he returned with another of our companions to carry the body of the Chantry sister back to her home.”

“Vael put himself out?  He must have found a nice little whore he’d warmed up to and lifted enough coin off the body to pay another visit.”

_Try again, Aeryn._  “Perhaps you aren’t aware of the fact that Sebastian was a brother in the Chantry for over ten years, he’s…”

“No longer though, is he?  Got tired of his game hiding behind the Grand Cleric’s skirts and managed to get out before the mages destroyed Kirkwall?  And now he’s a mercenary like you?”  She leaned down into Aeryn’s space and asked, “Did he promise to make you famous, feeding off his name?”

“My lady, if you’ll read the letter.”

She shoved the paper back at Aeryn, who caught it without crumpling the sheet too badly.  “I don’t care what that wasted slut wants of Cleve, we owe him nothing.  Let him mewl at the gates of some other city. Priden has enough beggars of her own and I have no interest in selling out the independence we’ve gained as a free city to an oathbreaker.”

Aeryn lashed down her temper, trying not to think how Sebastian’s shoulders might slump at that insult, and replied, in as cool a tone she could muster.  “Messere Vael isn’t collecting debts.  I’m only here as your father…”

“My father might be entranced with being in service to Starkhaven again, but the last fifteen years have proven we have no need of the great Vael family.”

Fifteen years?  Aeryn nodded, at odds with her confusion.  “No.  Priden and Cleve’s holdings appear most well cared for.  After all, we met no bandits nor aided any travelers on our journey here.”

Consternation bled through the woman’s sneer, but Zenna answered blandly enough, “Bandits are troublesome throughout Thedas.”

“Hmm.  Yes.  And in most areas, the local nobility would be most concerned.”  Aeryn glanced tepidly around the room at the gawping crowd.  “Priden seems an interesting place.  We shall trouble you no further.  Until your father arrives, of course.” Aeryn bowed abruptly but Zenna merely shrugged a shoulder as she turned away to another courtier.

“We shall see.”

Varric and Bethany matched Aeryn’s slow, elegant stride out of Cleve’s courtyard, collecting their weapons from the now blank-faced guard before they were shown the way out by a bustling page through a side gate and out into the streets.

They walked in silence down the cobbled path, crossing a small side street and finally pausing at a green.  Across the way was a row of fine villas, most with ornate Orlesian style facades behind elaborate wrought iron gates.

“She couldn’t have…met Sebastian ever.  Talking about him that way.”  Bethany offered.

“Seems like he was really telling the truth, if that’s how people remember him.”  Varric shook his head.  “It’s hard to fathom it, Hawke.”

“So what do we do now?”

Aeryn stood stock still for a moment, letting the foot traffic flow past them.  Priden was almost a city in itself, if not as large as Kirkwall certainly it competed with Amaranthine.  Which meant there were quarters.  And an underground.

“What we should have done before.  Varric, you said the Guild had an office here?”  When he nodded she continued,  “Go set us up with a decent line of credit, make sure we can access the accounts here.  Bethany and I are going to scout around, find a tailor and a dressmaker, and check out the residences.”

“What kind of credit?”

“Enough to rent us a house for a… year.  Around here, if we can manage.”  She pointed out the fine villas farther down the pavement.

“A house? But…”

“We need a base, we need _stillroom_ s and a practice court.  I don’t want Sebastian anywhere near that,”  she paused to pop her neck before she continued, ” _Keep_ until he’s fit to be seen.”

“I thought the arrangement was to stay with the Bann,” Bethany said uncertainly.

“It was.  I’m changing it.  It was one thing to stay in the palace at Denerim.  Sebastian needed that connection with Alistair.  Here…even once Cleve gets back, I want Sebastian to have an aura of independence.  We’re smack up against that old reputation of his, clearly.  He can’t be lollygagging in taverns and inns.”

Varric contemplated for a minute.  “You’re setting up as Lady Hawke.”

“That’s right.”

“That’s…servants, too, then.”

Aeryn agreed with a nod, “Yeah.  See if your connection has an idea about that.  At least a cook, a scullery maid, and a doorguard.  Check out the rumors about the criminal gangs too.”

Varric followed her eye.  She was watching a knot of children, all under apprentice age but too young to be so unchaperoned gathered on the corner.  “You need a couple of runners, too.”

“Yes, I will.”  Aeryn cleared her face and fixed a genial expression before she strode over, fanning a couple of silvers between her fingers.  “Who’s bored, today?”  She asked the suddenly silent group.

“Us, messere!”

“Good.  I’ve got this bit for someone who can tell me if there’re any houses empty.”

A small plump boy with a pair of bright brown eyes chirped up.  “Over about two streets.  Just before Merchant’s Row and the Green.”

Aeryn flashed one coin in the dim light.  “And?”

“One’s been empty forever, roof’s gone in back but you can’t tell from th’front.  But t’other’s just gone out maybe a couple of months.  Old man died, no kids.”She flipped him the coin.  His hand was faster than he looked.

“There’s still onions in the kitchen garden,” a girl with knobby elbows and a dark splash of mud across her cheek added.

“Really?  I’m not partial to onions, myself.”

“My mam says you got to eat ‘em else your teeth’ll fall out.”

“Well, your mam’s right.  Or at least she agrees with mine.  Alright.  Now.  Who can point me to the nicer inns where the folk who visit the bann might stay.”

“’Long the Green, that way.  There’s a circle and another.  Circle closest to the river is cheapest but the other one’s nicer.”  Aeryn flipped the girl, gangly as she approached adolescence, another coin.

“Anything else, messere?”

“Yes, actually.”  She looked over the group with narrowed eyes.  “You all have jobs?”

“I haul potatoes.”

“I run messages”

“I help m’da with the rag cart.”

“Those’re all fine.  I have a job, maybe long term for someone, but you lot sound nice and busy.”

“Not all of us.  What’s the job?”  The small plump boy’s eyes were sharp on their dusty, rent clothes and the boots with worn soles.

“Running a few errands.  Carrying messages.  That sort of thing.  Strictly above board.”

“For you?  You’re buying a house?”

She grinned at him.  “ _I’m_ asking if one of you needs a job and I‘m the one with coin enough to pay you.”  He shrugged and Aeryn went on, “In a few hours, maybe a day, a man and an elf are going to be looking for me.  I need to know, before they get to the Keep’s gate.”

“You in trouble? “

“Nope, they’re friends of mine, but we had to split up.  I don’t want them to run _into_ trouble.”

“Now, if you can find them and give them an easy message from me and then come find me at one of those inns on the nicer circle. Whoever gets to me fastest, but I’ll know if you cheat.  You’ll get an easy runner job, a couple silver a week and meals.  If you need a place to stay…”

“We ain’t gutter trash, we got homes!”  The tall, stolid looking girl answered, flushing to her tight black braids.

“Grand!  I’m not running an orphanage.”  Aeryn had seen three of the gang chirk up though and she made a note of their faces.

“What do they look like?”

“Varric?”

He’d already flipped his chapbook out and two good likenesses of Sebastian and Fenris were showing.   “The man’s very tall.  The elf...well, looks like that.”  One of the girls giggled and they nodded.

“What’s the message, then, messere?”

“All you have to tell them is Hawke is not in the Keep.   The elf is going to ask you to prove you’re from me.  You’re to tell him one word…it’s very important that you know the word, too.  He’s got a short temper.  The word is…” she paused dramatically and grinned as a couple of the kids leaned in, “Fishheads.”

“ _Fishheads_?”  They chorused in bemusement

“Yup.  He’ll growl about it, but don’t worry, he doesn’t bite.  Then, if they will, lead them back to the inn.  If not, then come get me.  If I hear about it before they get to the Keep, then you get your job.”

“How long?”

“Depends.  At least a couple of weeks, enough to put by some coin. Now, are you sure you understand?” The group nodded like their heads were on strings and Aeryn nodded back.

Varric and Bethany had been exchanging glances behind her the whole time and she finally asked, “What?”

“Well…we don’t want a repeat of Macie.”

“And we aren’t going to have one.  Those kids aren’t pickpockets.  They’re just…kids.”

“Takes one to know one.”

Varric bowed towards her and she dipped a curtsey in response before telling Bethany, “They were suspicious of adults, but they weren’t scared of us.  They had jobs.  One or two of them are definitely not at home, right now, but they haven’t been sucked into a guild yet, either.  I just need a couple of kids I can reasonably trust to do some basic errands short term.“

“Aeryn…”

“This isn’t going to be Macie all over again, alright?  I’ve no interest in stirring up whatever underground runs through Priden, except to clean up its edges, if need be and Cleve requests it.  And if whoever it is attaches themselves to Sebastian…well, we’ll deal with that, too.”    

They followed the directions to the Green, as given by their new friends. Aptly named, a wide swath of neatly trimmed grass beginning to brighten in the spring light and gardens outlined with evergreen box between two wide lanes. It was bordered on the Keepside by neat houses and on the other by shops of various sorts with ornate painted facades, clearly influenced by Orlesian tastes for curlicues and embellishment.

“Well, Stef’s shop is just down the Greenway, according to her letters.  I’ll go and get us set up.”  Varric cocked his head at Aeryn. “You sure you have enough to get us rooms?”

“And dress us all decently for a few days, so long as one of those tailors has some readymade things or is willing to be bribed to hand some over.”  Aeryn confirmed.  “But that’s the end of our coin, if your deal doesn’t hold true, Varric.”

The dwarf grinned at her and set off, spinning on his heel to remind her, “It’ll be fine Hawke, have I ever let you down?” Hands spread beseechingly before he saluted Bethany and checked back around, striding away through the taller, mostly human, pedestrians.

Aeryn watched him go as Bethany looked over the merchant storefronts.  “Well, there are two tailors with tunics and trousers over there and then a dressmaker between them that looks reasonably fashionable.  Shall we? Or are we going to find the inn first?”

“As much as I hate to try to find accommodations looking like this, I want access to at least a pitcher of water before we go dress shopping.“  Aeryn thumbed a streak of dirt off of her half-handed glove.

Bethany agreed.  “I’m not sure a decent shop would let us touch their goods much less try anything on.”

The sisters did get a curious glance or two as they strolled down the street.  Armor didn’t seem a common clothing choice in Priden and they stood out amongst the dresses, cloaks, and doublets.  

A few blocks beyond, in the first circle off the Greenway and just beyond a few temporary shop stalls, they spied the first inn.  Perusing the offerings of the first stall; notions, ribbons, and cheaply made adornments,  they observed their surroundings.   Aeryn eyed the cut of cloth and the boots of the people staying in the two inns.  “Merchants and better paid mercs living off of coin from their last jobs, if I had to guess.  Let’s keep going.”

A few minutes later, they found themselves among higher company.  “Perhaps we should have done the clothes, despite being a little on the filthy side?”  Bethany whispered after a tall gentleman and his companion in pale salmon silk skirted by them on the bricked pathway, the man blatantly setting himself between them and the lady in her confection.

“Too late now.  But yeah, probably.”  Aeryn glanced around and sniffed.  “Hmm.  What do you think of that?”  She shrugged her chin towards two more women, one in mint and the other in lilac.

“Wider skirts.  Corsets.  Ugh.” Bethany wrinkled her nose.  “I’m not sure our new things are up to snuff, Aeryn.”

“We’ll see, likely you’re right.  It’s too bad.”

“Can we afford…”  She stopped at Aeryn’s exasperated expression.

“Yes, we’re fine.  Believe me, I busted my arse in Kirkwall but it paid well.  So long as Varric’s dealings hold.”  She qualified.

They found themselves outside a stuccoed façade, mirroring the curlicues they’d seen on the high street.  It was quiet, on the far edge of the circle off the green and beyond it was a set of stables.

There were a few patrons entering the arched entrance near a placard proclaiming luncheon across from them in the mossy bricked courtyard, an older, sedate set of clientele.  Aeryn raised her eyebrow and glanced at Bethany.  “Think we can pull off dignified and quiet?”

“Well.  Iif Isabela and Merrill were with us, I’d say no, but I think the rest of us can.  For a day or so.”  Bethany’s jaw worked as she observed the scene.  “Aeryn…what about Fenris?”  The people they’d seen since stepping off the Green road were entirely human.

Her sister scuffed her toe along the faded red cobble of the gutter before she answered.  “I…You’re right.  I have enough coin to make it worth their while, I think.  But if we have to, we’ll stay somewhere else.  I won’t let him be made uncomfortable.”

There was a separate entrance to the taller wing of the building and Aeryn held open the door for Bethany.  At a low oak desk, a slender old man looked over his hooked nose at them.

“Can I help you girls?”

Aeryn raised an eyebrow at him.  “We’re hoping to hire some rooms, serah.”  The silky, low accent she used was a perfect mimic of their mother.

“We’ve only the higher end rooms, suites they’re called, available.”

“And suites will do nicely, after we’ve been assured that the accommodations are worth your cost.” She nodded at the chalkboard, with a list of prices that would make the madame at the Blooming Rose blush.  “Two for tonight and we’ll need a third, tomorrow.”

He looked them over with rheumy brown eyes and Bethany felt as if the dark travel stains on her trousers were glowing.  “I’ll have to see your coin.”

Aeryn didn’t drop his gaze as she flicked two night’s worth of gold onto his desk, then  briskly swept them back up before the clerk’s quick hand could do more than brush the edge. “And now, I’ll see your rooms.”

“Of course, messere.”

He rang a small silver bell and a trim middle aged woman came to the door.  “Show these women the third floor, Perla.”

She bobbed a curtsey so wobbly that Aeryn just refrained from reaching out a steadying hand and led the way up a small flight of stairs.  The door at the third flight opened up into a wide hallway floored in shining fruitwood planks.  “There’s bedrooms beyond each door.  And a bath, too.  Just pull these strings and you can get your tea or hot water or whatever your needing of a night.”

The rooms were small, but clean and the furnishings were well polished.  The chairs were upholstered in leather, nicely worn.  It all smelled fresh and when Aeryn flicked back a blue and white woven coverlet the linens were brightly white and lavender scented.   They could do worse.  “How’s the food, Perla?”

“Oh, we’ve a fine cook and my mistress has a cool hand with her pastry.  Did you see the crowd out for lunch?  Smoked rabbit pie today, it’s the specialty.  And Henri was putting together the ingredients for spiced partridge with pickled beets and candied ginger trifle for dinner.” She smacked her lips, appreciatively.   

“Sounds delightful.”  Bethany said with a faint smile, hoping her stomach wouldn’t growl at the thought.    

“I think we’ll settle for this, then.”  Aeryn nodded.  “Can you ask the maid to bring up some water so we can get freshened up while I go down to pay?”

“Take care of it myself, messere.  Are you wanting lunch, too?  Guests are allowed meals in private but I’d best hurry if you are.”

“Yes, that’s grand.  Enough for three, please, as we’ll have a friend joining us.”

“As you like.”  Perla bobbed her wobbly curtsey again and left them.

“You get first crack at the bath, Beth.  I’ll go settle.”

“If you insist.  Don’t forget, though…”

“I don’t ever forget Fenris, sister dear.”

“Is it all to your approval, then, messere?”  The clerk asked, with just a hint of exasperation in his tone as Aeryn trotted back down the stairs.

She nodded. “Only one thing further.  As I said, we’ll be needing another room tomorrow…”

“The whole floor is yours, two more beds just down the hall.  It’s slow this early in the year.”

“Grand.  May I finish?”

He nodded.

“One of the companions to join us is an elf, another a dwarf.  Is that a problem?”

“We got servant quarters…”

“Not servants.  The elf is my partner and both are friends.”  Aeryn held his gaze for a moment.  “Is that a problem?” she asked again, slower,clipping her words.  She didn’t intend to have her meaning misunderstood.

“Oh.  I see.”  The clerk removed the oculus he’d been wearing to check his books and rubbed it clean on his linen apron.  “No, messere.  Not for us here at Shepherd’s Arms.  But…might I suggest a private dining in the evening once your elf...ah, friend comes?  Lunch should be no issue, we get all types come and go…but.”  He grimaced.  “Some of the guests will object to one in their midst, if he’s not serving.”

“How much more?”

“Since you’ve the whole floor, it’s none extra.  We’ll set up in the common room between your bedrooms, if it’s agreeable.”

Aeryn weighed the man’s apprehension for a moment before she nodded.  “It is.  I appreciate your tact in this.”

He shrugged.  “You get working with them, you see they’re not so different.  But the rich folk we have come through….they only have servants.  Or worse.”  

“Right.  Eleven gold, then, for three nights?”

“Yes, messere.  Breakfast is served from sunrise to nine bells, but we can make arrangements for earlier or late, if need be.”

“No, that should be fine.”  He turned the book towards her and held out his quill.  Aeryn hesitated only a moment before signing her name as she’d done a thousand times in Kirkwall.  “A. Hawke.” Sebastian didn’t want to hide, didn’t want to pretend.  Well, she wouldn’t.  And hope his prayers would cover them.  “Now, we’re ahead of our trunks, serah.  Could you perhaps direct me to a dressmaker that might be able to make my sister and me up a few trifles until they catch up?”

They’d both bathed and found the least filthy thing they owned to change into.  Another tug of the bell brought up an elvhen serving girl, Ladia.  “Is there a laundry on premises?”

“We send most things out, messere.”  She frowned at the pile of their clothes.  “My…” she stopped.  “If you have a day or so?”

“At least.”

“My mam takes in washing.  She’s cheaper than the inn’s woman, but it’ll get done nicer.  You’ve got all that embroidery and such.  Tanya sometimes gets in a rush with anything fancy.”

“How much?”  Aeryn took out her purse again and grimaced at the dwindling glimmer of coin.  She’d be scraping the gilt of her daggers, in a day or two.

With their laundry settled and both as fresh as clean water and dirty clothes could make them, they headed back to the Greenway.

“Just a moment.” Aeryn paused before they turned into the dressmaker’s shop, to clear her face and pinch her cheeks, fluffing her bangs in the glass painted with “Madame Ortenzia, Dressmaker to the Nobility” in flowing Common and Orlesian scripts.  

Bethany smoothed her own hair before asking hesitantly.  “Do we have to make it a game?  I’ve never been all that good at that, you know.”

The calculation that had been clear on Aeryn’s features dropped away, leaving them blank.  Except for a slight hint of disappointment.  “Well, I suppose not.  If you’d prefer.”

A slim elf, her dark chestnut hair in elegant braids and her hazel eyes set wide and tilted, greeted them as they answered.  with a decidedly annoyed air.  “May I help you?  Ladies?”

Bethany glanced at her sister from the corner of her eye and then draped herself against the doorframe as if exhausted and sighed, “Oh, I certainly hope so!”

In a conspiratorial blink, Aeryn was a different self, her hands fluttering.  “My sister and I are _desperate_ …all of our trunks and boxes just _torn apart_ , everything _ruined_.  The whole of it, everything we’d brought along.  It’s a _disaster_.  And now here we are and my betrothed is set to meet me and all we have are these things we’ve been travelling in for just _days_.”  She plucked at the tunic, glad that though it had seen better days, the quality was unmistakable.

“Oh, I see. Oh, dear.”

Bethany hid a smile at the way the elf seemed to believe every outrageous thing coming from her seemingly hysterical sister’s quick mouth and did her best to look exasperated and distraught as Aeryn added, “We were sent _straight_ here by everyone we met.  Sure that your mistress would be perfectly capable of putting us right.”

Stiffening, the young elf sniffed, “Actually, this is my mother’s store.”

“Oh.  Oh, goodness, _forgiv_ e me.  I’m _terrible_.”  Tears welled up in Aeryn’s wide eyes. “Of _course_ it is.”

“It’s…an understandable mistake,” the young woman allowed graciously.  “Please, sit down and I…I’ll bring you tea.  My mother is...”

Another elf, lines of age and laughter around her exquisite dark eyes, stood in the doorway that the first pointed them towards.  “I am Ortenzia.  I understand there’s been an accident?”  She, too, had a faint Orlesian accent lacing her voice.

“Beth, _darling_ , could you?”  Aeryn mopped at her face with a neat lace hanky that she’d pulled from… somewhere.  Beth marveled at the idea that Aeryn would even have such a thing along with her.

Bethany did her best to live up to her sister’s story, finally summing up, “So, you see, we need a little of everything.  My sister’s betrothed’s patron has most of our heavier things on the barge.  But, oh let’s see, we do need several frocks for daytime and evening…a travel set of course, and all the trimmings, each.”

“Well.  I haven’t much made up, we almost entirely work to order.  Although…”  Ortenzia tapped a slender finger to her mouth, lips tinted a dark purple that brought out warmth in her skin.  “Alright, yes, perhaps we can get you set up.  Certainly for a day or so.”

“You’re _love_ ly.  Oh, you _are_.  How wonderful.”

The dressmaker held up her elegant hand, cautioning, “It will cost…”

Aeryn waved her hand.  “Oh never mind that.  We did manage to bring our purses.  And the jewels.”

The last concern fled from the elvhen woman’s face as the unmistakable soft clink of gold sounded under Aeryn’s fingers.  “In that case, I have one or two customers who were…reluctant…to pay properly for their orders in the last season.  I imagine a few of their things can be cut down to suit you.”  She cast a professional assessing eye over Aeryn and Bethany.  “Hmm.  Yes.  Aster, the pink and grey stripe and the green and white floral.”  She waved her daughter off and added, “Follow me if you would, ladies, I’ll have just enough time to get you measured up before the next appointment.”

Madame Ortenzia was quick and efficient, much to Aeryn’s delight and by the time Aster had brought the two day dresses and a cup of strong, sweet hot tea for them, had both of their basic measurement and color preferences recorded in a little red chapbook.   She whipped Bethany into an smart dark pink striped day gown, high on the ankle for practicality and loosely fitted...clearly meant to be gathered up in a more fitted corset.  Another in striking garnet velvet, lay to the side.

“The new style is very practical.  One may stay comfortable at home and be belted up in the case of company or preference.  Most are made with the lacing in front, so as to preclude the need for a maid.”

“Oh, that’s excellent.  We are, I’m afraid, without servants at the moment.  Changing households is _so_ disorganizing.”  Understanding dawned on Ortenzia’s pointed features.

“Where shall we send for you, then, when the other things are finished?”

“We have a friend liquidating a few trifles and then we’re staying at the Shepherd’s Arms for the next few days, but really, we just couldn’t go around looking like vagabonds.  Hopefully it won’t be too difficult to find a reasonable house to rent in a…safe…area.”

The first offering that Ortenzia had for Aeryn was a perfectly acceptable deep blue wool kirtle with a lighter steelblue floral underskirt.  A travelling garment and meant to wear well, though there was an excess of decorative beading on the bodice that the seamstress felt could be removed quickly.  “For tonight, however,” she spread her hands helplessly, “I’m afraid all I’d have in your size, even that I could take up quickly is,” Ortenzia flicked opened a muslin wrapping to reveal a beautiful pale green kirtle in a fine wool over a pristine white bliaut.  The elegance of the cut was obscured under an unfortunate froth of lace and ribbon.

“Oh.”  Bethany hid a smile at the idea of her sister in something so frivolous.

“It’s…rather young.”   Aeryn said diplomatically.  But the wool was beautifully draped and dyed and smooth under the tips of her fingers as she stroked it.  

“It was made for a very young woman.  As was the other, but her mother was able to restrain her on the travelling suit.”

“Except for the beads.”  Aster reminded her own mother with a look that said she’d done a fair bit of the beading herself.

“Anyway…I can remove this and this.  And most of this, in a trice.  Only the waist and the bit about the arms and then the trim…the wool is so fine that I would have to replace it with something and I haven’t anything in at the moment that would do.   Except more ribbon.  And I’m afraid the undergarments are…worse.  And I can’t adjust them at all without destroying them.”

“Well.  Beggars can’t be choosers.”  Aeryn said resignedly.  “I imagine I’m lucky to have much of a choice at all.”  Aster pointed her to the changing screen and went back to adjusting the waist on Bethany’s dress.

“Trimmings are rather effusive at the moment.  Everyone is taking the Orlesian court as a model.  Even the men are falling into it.”  Even as she spoke, Ortenzia was turning the garment to the inside out and handing it to Aster who went to work with a tiny forked blade to rip out the stitches holding the offending adornment.

“Is that so?”  As she slipped the bliaut over her head, Aeryn grimaced at the idea of Fenris and Sebastian in such over the top attire.  Varric might find it amusing for an evening or two and Sebastian was a good sport about such things, though he’d grumble behind closed doors.  Fenris would cut sharp.

“Yes, I had to sell a length of chartreuse lace with blue silk ribbon to the haberdasher next door yesterday, Johran said a customer had seen it in the window and simply had to have it for his new coat.  How is it fitting, messere?”

“Probably better than I could have hoped.”   She stepped out from behind the screen and Ortenzia brought over a darker green corset to lace.

Aeryn looked rather fragile out of her leather and heavy wool and Bethany frowned, inwardly.

It was the cut of the waist, the delicate color, and the way the lace framed Aeryn’s sharp collarbones, she decided, that combined to make her sister looks so ethereal.  But still. _Let’s hope the inn holds up to its promise of good food_ , she thought.  Aeryn needed feeding up before they began their campaign again.

“Oh!” The younger seamstress had caught sight of the ugly scar left by Corypheus’ magic, burning down Aeryn’s arm.  Elegant’s cream and the elfroot salve hadn’t had quite enough time to fade it away.

“Just a little accident.  It looks worse than it is.”  Aeryn assured the girl.  

“Does it…does it hurt?”

“Not in the least.”

Ortenzia cut her daughter off.  “I have a pair of fingerless kidskin gloves that will suit that dress perfectly.  In the back, Aster.  The third blue drawer.”  She appraised the two sisters anew and Aeryn’s posture changed minutely, but Bethany realized there was no point in lying if the dressmaker asked.  However, the elf was a sensible woman and simply nodded and brought out her book.

“Allow me to add you up and we’ll be finished for today, messeres, though I’ll have to schedule you in for another fitting.”

Properly dressed again, they made arrangements for the men, next door.  The tailor seemed put out that they insisted on the plainest of garments; fine wool tunics and fitted leather trews in the sizes Aeryn had memorized from their last shopping expedition.  

“We’ll be back, I’m sure, serah.”  Bethany told him as he slowly packaged up the few things that he’d had to hand.  “If our fellows are well pleased by this order, I have no doubt they’ll want to order more interesting items.”

They drew looks again as they walked back to the inn, but this time it was for their looks and not their terribly unfashionable clothing.  The door to the inn was held open for them by a quick-minded boy in an outrageous waistcoat.  The pup looked, to Aeryn, to be all of nineteen and his tanned face blushed pink when Bethany smiled at him in thanks.

“Much better.”  The deskclerk nodded at them as they approached the stairs.  

Aeryn paused and raised her eyebrow at him until he, too, flushed red around his cheekbones.  “My thanks, serah.”  She finally said, with as little menace as she could manage.  Some got away from her.  It had been a long day, after all.  And she'd had too little of Sebastian's softening influence, of late.  

“Th...there’s a note for you, messere.”  His hand shook a little and Bethany clicked her tongue at Aeryn, disapprovingly.  

Aeryn glanced at the handwriting.  “From Varric,” she explained to Bethany.  “He has an errand to see to but he’ll be in by dinner.  And he’s glad to see the bar is decently stocked.”

“None finer in Priden.”  Perla chimed as she whisked a cloth along a perfectly clean windowsill. “Unless you lodge at the Keep.”

“Good to know.”  Aeryn led the way up the stairs.

The two sisters took their time readying themselves for dinner before convening in the sitting room of the small suite.   Bethany had held her tortoiseshell brush and pins out and Aeryn took them with a smile.

Combing her fingers through Bethany’s thick hair was like turning back pages of an old story.  “Braid it back, would you?  Just to get it out of my face.”  

“Sure.” There were three silver strands that gleamed in the dark brown mass, just at the crown of her skull and Aeryn twirled the lock around her thumb, lost in thought.  

Mother had gone silver early and Father had had streaks at his temples when he died at forty three.  If Carver had lived, would he be going as well or was it just stress and magic turning her sister’s hair early?

Her own hair, ragged as it was at the moment, was still as red as ever.  

But Mother had laughed humorlessly when her own went, saying that her own mother’s had still been rich as mahogany when she’d last seen her.

“Remember that little cabin we had on the lake, Aeryn?”  Her sister was tracing circles on the planks beside her legs, tucked under her on the cushion she’d tossed to the floor before she’d sat.

Aeryn watched Bethany’s long finger move, pause in her silence and continue in its arc, before she answered.  “Hmm…outside of Redcliffe?”

Bethany released her held breath and pushed farther.  “Yes.  Remember going swimming?”

“Sure.  That’s where you and Carver learned.  I remember, too, Mother insisted we wear vests and smalls, even though there was never anyone around for miles, except for the occasional boat.”

Bethany settled back against her knees, relieving the way Aeryn had tugged at her hair plaiting her long bangs into a crown.  “That’s where we found out I was a mage.”

“Yes, it was.”  Carver had tossed Bethany’s doll in the water and she’d set his fishing pole alight.

And then they’d moved.  Quickly, as usual.  You could have seen Kinloch from the docks on a rare clear day.  Not the best place for a mage to live at all, much less one just learning her magic.  Looking back, it seemed as if Father had been thumbing his nose at the Circle, settling so close.

She twisted back another section of hair in the dimming room as Bethany set the candle alight with a lazy flick of her finger.  Only to jump guiltily at a sharp rapping on the door and Perla’s country tinged Common call out.

“Messere Hawke?  Your dwarf of business has come in.  Laida’s got him sitting in the dining room.”

“Thank you, please tell him we’ll be down in a moment.”

“Of course, messere.”

**  
**


	34. Chapter 34

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to faejilly for her timely beta, though all mistakes are my own. And atomicpen and breadedsinner for their constant cheerleading. ****so many hugs****

The small silver bell hanging over the door jangled again, and Aeryn jerked her head up to watch another pair of Priden’s over-dressed upper class folk stroll in to partake of the Shepherd’s Arms fine dinner menu.

Two days, with reports of blizzards and closed passages in the hills above the town, and yet no word of Sebastian and Fenris.

Night was creeping in on them, and she wasn’t foolish enough to go exploring unfamiliar territory in the dark.  Tomorrow, though.  She’d be on the road tomorrow she decided, settling back against the planks of the small boxed in dining table to poke at the delicate sauce the cook had layered between tender slices of fish.

“You look like a cat with missing kittens, Hawke.”

“What?”  She whipped around to look at Varric who raised his eyebrow at her.

“I’m surprised you aren’t lashing your tail and meowing.”

Aeryn blanked her face, glancing around at the crowded room.  She saw a few faces smiling sympathetically at her and had to fight to keep from squirming.  Raising her chin, she took a bite of fish from the edge of her tableknife and twitched her shoulder.  “They’re fine.  They probably got held up in Tellend by the snow.”

“I’m sure.”   The knee pat Bethany added was _meant_ to be sympathetic as well and Aeryn swallowed back a snarl to give her sister a thin smile.  It certainly wasn’t Beth’s fault that Aeryn might throw sparks at the least provocation.

Bethany had ducked her own chin, a curtain of dark hair hiding her face and it dawned on Aeryn that her sister was just as worried and with less personal knowledge of their missing companions’ capabilities.

She said again. “They’re _fine_.  Fenris is a hard fellow to trap. And Sebastian has the sense to listen to him.” _tomorrow tomorrow tomorrow_ buzzed at the back of her brain, but  Aeryn just leaned into her sister’s shoulder and got a small, truer lift of lips in return.

“Broody is the most resourceful guy I’ve ever met, short of you and the Rivani.”  Varric agreed.  He left off agreeing about Sebastian’s good sense though and Aeryn rolled her eyes at him as she flicked the ribbon that trailed from her delicate lace sleeve out of danger from trailing through her supper, again.    

The bell chimed again and she didn’t look up.  It wasn’t him nor even one of the scamps.  Step was too heavy.

But…that accent.  Her eyes snapped up and then away.  The woman’s voice was smoother than the man’s, but that Orlesian nasal whine nearly obliterating the Starkhaven lilt was something Aeryn had grown accustomed to while onboard Robard’s boat.  “Ifren, take our things up to the room and wait.  You can dine when we’re done.”

“Of course, messere.”  A solidly built elf with delicate golden earrings piercing the pinnae of his well-shaped ears bobbed a bow and continued through the room to the rear stairs.  She didn’t track him, though his was the strongest Starkhaven accent she’d heard yet.  Keeping eyes on a servant was sure to make her conspicuous.

She took another bite of the fish and glanced at the window behind them, the evening’s dark allowing the reflections to bear almost true.

Ifren’s employer was tall and spare and the wool cloak she wore was lined in mink.  As she pushed back her hood, Aeryn chanced a fleeting look.  She revealed strong slashing brows over a leonine nose and hazel eyes set in her brown face.  The man behind her was shorter, but just as finely dressed and similarly complected, though his eyes leaned to the yellow side of green and his freckles leant him a less imperial air.

The front maid, Laida, scurried up to seat them, nodding when the man asked for one of the private dining alcoves, shaded by curtains along the far wall.  Aeryn and her companions were using one as well, though they’d kept the curtains open at every meal they’d taken. Laida seated them right next to their own.

Aeryn could have kissed her, but settled for slipping a sovereign into her skirt pocket as the young woman brushed past the table.

The couple did draw the curtains.  But there was a broken panel in the wall between them, and the sound echoed, just enough.  Aeryn lifted her fingers and Varric caught her high sign and launched into a bit of gossip he’d picked up about the Orlesian court and their recent addiction to baby squid, much to Bethany’s dismay.

“Fried.  And stuffed with candied tomato, I think, is the way the Empress prefers them.”  His trained voice was the perfect volume to make it seem like their table would be absorbed entirely in his story.  But Aeryn, sitting closest to the shared panel wall, could hear the couple from Starkhaven complaining about their journey, the inn, and the distraction of their servant.

“He’s not been the same since we took that ferry at Herrock,” the man was sighing.

“Well.  I think those slavers going north gave him pause.  After all, his son…”

“Hmmph.  Yes.  Likely that was it.”  The maid delivered a bottle of wine, making a momentary pause.  News of slavers wasn’t anything she hadn’t heard before, but Aeryn was curious as to why the elf’s son had anything to do with them.  Sebastian had long insisted that Starkhaven was free of such trouble.

Had been.  She reminded herself.  He hasn’t been home in a very long time.

“Well, have you decided, Gerry?  Will we go back for the Adhairts’ house party?”

“It’s just a fishing week, though isn’t it, Gert?  Do you want to?”

Gert paused.  “No.  No, I don’t.  It’s not the same anymore.  Everyone’s so…”  There was a longer pause and Aeryn forced herself not to fidget when Gerry grunted in agreement.  The worst part of eavesdropping was listening in on two people who knew each other well enough to use the shorthand language that always cropped up among compatriots.  “I think we should go to Ansberg.  Maitlin was fairly insistent that they’d enough room.  It was…kind of him.”

“We haven’t been to Tourney in an age.  Just the thing.” Gerry agreed, gruffly.  He sounded, to Aeryn’s mind, as if he was doing his best to cheer his companion up.  Why?  It could, of course be some private matter.  She’d swear these two were related.  Perhaps Gert was a widow?  Been jilted?  Lost her fortune in a tragic hand of Diamondback?  That would explain uncomfortable kindnesses.

“Aeryn.”

She flicked an annoyed hand at Bethany.   _Everyone’s so…what?_

Hawke!”

She looked up to glare at Varric only to see one of the street corner urchins, waving a frantic hand, trying to get her attention from the door, to the upset of the inn’s clerk.

In a slither of fabric, and grabbing the boiled wool cloak she’d brought down, Aeryn abandoned her supper and forced herself to glide across the dining room towards the girl.

“Serah…Hawke...  We’ve got ‘em, right after they came in Southgate.  Bindy’s showing them the way.  I ran ‘cause I’m fastest.”  Kayla gasped, one hand clutching her side and putting truth to the story.

“Oh, well done!”  She fanned out a few silver to drop in the girl’s hand and was surprised to be waved off.

“No, ma’am.  Give it to Bindy.  He’s been real careful about your men.  And…his mam’s sick. He needs it…”  Aeryn caught her hand and put the silver into it.

 

“I’ll pay him.  But you ought to have something, alright?”  Aeryn turned to the clerk, frowning at them.  “Is there somewhere she can…”

“I’m good, serah.”  Kayla bit her lip, looking rabbitish with her two buckteeth, “We might need to go meet them.  One of your men…”  She broke off in a series of violent sneezes before she snuffled disgustingly and rubbed her nose with her sleeve.

The bottom dropped out of Aeryn’s stomach and she started to fling her cloak over her shoulders.  “Show me.”  Under the thick folds of wool, she slipped her hand into the small slit she’d made in her skirts and pulled out the dagger she’d strapped to the outside of her thigh.  And then…

The night was gloomy and damp and the torches around the entrance of the inn threw lurid wavery patterns of light around the slick cobbles.   But Aeryn would know that figure anywhere, even hunched and awkward as he was, aiding his friend from the back of the cart.  She slid the blade back into its sheath, unable to keep quiet.

Sebastian heard his name whispered and lifted his head.

Aeryn’s face was alight.  And when she realized he’d seen her, the brilliance of her smile stopped him in his tracks, trying to rearrange Fenris’ awkward bulk.

“Aeryn?”  She was on his left in a flash, helping to take some of Fenris’ weight from him and her smile had turned to concern, brief as lightning.

But the warmth of it lingered.  Sebastian rubbed his chest where it tightened against his heart as she helped them into the well-lit inn.  Varric and Bethany had followed her to the door and Bethany slid in to take Aeryn’s place while she turned to the boy who had guided them through the streets and found a cart to bring them quickly to the inn.     

“You’re a good fellow, Bindy.  Thanks.”

“It’s a job.  M’dad always said to do it best you could, if you could get one.”

“Then your dad was pretty smart.”  Aeryn placed the heavy silver coins in his hand and they flashed to a hidden pocket.

“Do we…do we get it?  Me and Kayla?”  His round face was strained and his eyes were dark, lit only by the torches.

“Certainly.  Come round nine bells and we’ll arrange it all, alright?”  The two bobbed bows and scampered off and Aeryn forced herself to watch until they were out of the circle, out of her reach before she turned back to her men.

The clerk at the door was staring at their backs.  In fact, the whole dining room had gone quiet as the companions stumbled through.   Aeryn drew herself up and smiled at the older man.  “My fiancé and our partner.”  She reminded him.

“Yes.  I had not…expected…”  She forgot really, how unused well-off town folk could be to the rougher aspects of life.

“The weather was harsh, apparently.  A bit of rest and they’ll be fine, I’m sure.  And food, if you don’t…”

“Yes, messere, of course.”  He waved his hand at the maid closest to him and she ducked into the kitchen.  “Shall I send for the chirurgeon?”

“Gracious, no.  We’re well capable of dealing with a little cold, serah.  A bit of tea and soup and they’ll be right.”  She made a point to hesitate, and put her fingers to her lips uncertainly.  “I’m sure…well, if not, I’ll have you call later.”  Bethany could handle Fenris’ feet, she was sure, but better to dissipate any idea that they might have their own healing resources.  “But we’re from Ferelden, you know.  We’ve  a good idea of how to deal with the effects of cold.”

“Oh, yes of course.  Ferelden.”  That seemed to reassure him and Aeryn swept behind her friends, tucking the ends of her ribbons into her sleeves to get them out of the way.

Fenris felt Hawke’s familiar shape back under his arm and let his body sag a little more than he had while Bethany and Sebastian were helping him.  For all that Bethany was taller, Hawke was better able to bear the weight he couldn’t put on his feet, aching and worryingly numb in places.  And Sebastian had been coughing as much as he had, the last mile or so.

“And be glad they’re hurting, you idiot.”  Hawke was scolding him as she and Bethany hauled him up the stairs.  “At least you won’t lose them.”

“Hawke…”

“No.  You don’t listen.  Boots.  All you need is a pair of sodding boots and this shit wouldn’t happen.”  Varric held open the door to their floor.  Hawke glared up at her lover, who was barely standing upright and pointed at a low settle.  “You.  Sit there, get that wet leather off.  I’ll be right back.”

“Varric, I think you should dig up a few of those potions you scrounged.”  Bethany called over her shoulder.

“Sure thing, Sunshine.”  Varric popped open the small trunk next to their door in which he’d stashed the various bottles and started to sort through them.

Fenris interrupted Bethany’s next order with a series of violent, racking coughs that left him wheezing and ashen.  Hawke tightened her arm around his waist and spread her feet to bear him up while Bethany set her hand to his chest.  “I’m going to…” she started to warn him that she was going to use magic on him and he touched his gauntleted fingers to hers.

“Go on.”

He caught the briefest of smiles, before she ducked her head and closed her eyes and the warm, sunlit shot green of her healing pulsed across his skin.  It sparked along the lyrium lines of his tattoos, searing.

But he bore it.  And the next breath he took was less painful.

“Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me yet.  I can’t heal you, just the damage you’d done to your lungs and your feet.  You’ll have to weather the grippe, still.” Her long fingers were still pressed gently against his chest, his covering hers lightly.   He squeezed her hand

“Maker, Fenris, you weigh a ton.  Are the two of you done?”  Hawke complained.

He smiled at her wearily, replying in his fond, dry tone, “You complain.   Do you know how often I’ve hauled you away from a battle?”

“As often as I needed.”  Hawke’s crooked smirk preceded the tap on his foot.  She couldn’t stop smiling, the two of them back safe and whole.  Well, mostly whole, she reminded herself as Fenris shuddered against her and Sebastian covered his mouth, trying to hide a cough.  “Come on, let’s get you to bed.  Varric, would you mind?” she tipped her head towards Sebastian, eyes shut as his head leaned back on the settle.  “Cup of tea, lots of honey?”

A few moments later, between the two Hawkes, Fenris’ armor was stripped and set to the side with his sword.   Bethany had a kettle of heated water and Hawke was carefully washing away a layer of grime from his face and neck with a folded linen cloth while Bethany made her preparations, stoking up the fire and setting up a brew.

He managed to take the cloth away from Hawke, who kept glancing over her shoulder to the common room.  “I’ll manage.  Go and talk to him.”

“No, he’s alright.  Varric’s got him.”  They could hear Varric’s rich voice filling Sebastian in on why they were staying at the inn.  “What happened, why in the world didn’t you stay in Tellend?”

“We were already at the pass when the storm began in earnest.”

“Still, you could have gotten back before it got bad.”

“Sebastian wanted to go on. And…”  Fenris’ eyes cut to Bethany.  “I did, as well.”

Aeryn dropped her voice.  “She’s alright.”  In a louder tone, she added, “You’re both out of your mind.”

“We did find shelter.  It wasn’t our fault that the door was compromised.”

“That tower?” she frowned as she recalled the ruined martell.  He nodded.  “Were you attacked?”  An abandoned tower in the midst of hills…that wasn’t a safe shelter by any stretch of the imagination.

“Only by the wind and a large tree.  We saw that you fought, though.”

“Not really.  Just a bit of a skirmish.  A few of them got away with the papers.”

“Unlike you.  To let prey slip off.”  He coughed again and as Bethany brought him a warm cup of horehound tea, he watched Hawke’s face.  Her eyes lingered on her sister, again.

Seeing the look of understanding dawn, Aeryn reminded him, “Well, I promised Sebastian.”

“And you are always so obedient.”  He teased hoarsely and swallowed the bitter tea as Hawke rolled her eyes at him.

At the other end of the bed, Bethany frowned at Fenris’ long toes, prodding at the pale flesh with a careful, but resolute examining finger.  “Fenris…you’re lucky, I think Sebastian saved your feet.  There’s just a touch of frostbite, here on the edges of your toes.”

He ignored Hawke’s snort.  “I thought as much.”

“I can fix it, it’s just damage.  And the potion should take care of any infection.  But you have to stay off your feet for a day or so.  Are you ready?  This...”  She grimaced and met his eyes.  “It’s going to hurt, Fenris.  I’m sorry.”

“It is alright.  You don’t intend to hurt.”  He looked up at her through his bangs Bethany and she couldn’t help but smile at him and push them back fondly as Aeryn folded her washcloth in her hands.  “It makes a great deal of difference.”

“Well, then.  Aeryn, can you hold him?”

“Oh, am I still here?”  Bethany raised her eyebrow and Aeryn grinned.  “Of course.  But, we’d better call Varric in as well.  I can’t hold his feet and his hands both, if it’s...bad.”

Bethany nodded in agreement as she poured out another measure of healing potion.  It wasn’t strong enough to fix the dead nerves or blood vessels.  That was her job, but once she’d done the hard part the potion would take care of any small damage that lingered.  “That is a good thought.”

Aeryn slid off the bed and went to the door.  “Varric, a bit of help, if you don’t mind?”

Sebastian followed Varric in, cupping his tea in his hands.  He hadn’t removed the damp leathers, but Aeryn didn’t have the heart to scold him, the worry over Fenris etched in tired lines around his mouth.  She touched his arm, flashing him a look when he clutched her hand like a lifeline, a tremor in his usually solid grip.  “Just a few more minutes, alright?”

“No, it’s fine.  Is he well?  I did my best.”  His voice was steady enough.

“You did grand, love.  Beth says you saved his feet.  She’s just got to do some touch up.”  She kissed her fingers and brushed his cheek with the tips before turning back to the bed.

Varric was joking with Fenris, doing his level best to distract him.  “Who do you want to look at, Broody, me or Hawke?”

“As fine a specimen as you are, Varric, let Hawke handle my legs.  She’s faster if...I forget myself.”  

“Fine by me, I like my heart where it is.” Varric knelt up behind Fenris and laid his hands lightly on the elf’s shoulders.  “Alright, kid?”  He’d felt Fenris flinch under his touch, and swore inwardly at the feverish heat he encountered.  

“I am fine.  Get on with it. Please.”  They could all hear as Fenris tried to soften the harshness of his reply.  

Sitting on the end of the bed, Aeryn braced her hands on the hard bone of his shins and fixed her eyes on his face.   Fenris shut his eyes and then nodded.  Aeryn swallowed. “Alright, Beth.  Let’s get it over with.”

Sebastian was whispering behind her and Bethany recognized the prayer for Andraste’s healing grace.  It couldn’t hurt.  “Here we go.”

She curled her fingers around his bloodless toes, icy and unpleasantly damp.  Concentrating on the pulse she could feel, still, in the bottom of his foot.  

The first wave was painful, lighting the edges of his tattoos up, but manageable.  Fenris blew out his held breath and tried to concentrate on the warmth he could feel radiating from the mage...no, Bethany.   _Bethany_.  

Another wave, sending jagged biting pain across the dead nerves as they awoke, like spikes in his feet or _needles_ …

Fenris growled at the flash of broken memory more than the pain, but Aeryn tightened her hands and straddled his legs.  She could feel an ebb behind her and snapped, “Don’t stop.  Finish.”

“But…”

“It’s going to hurt now or later.  He can handle it.  Finish.”  Quietly, she murmured, “Fenris, hang on.  Almost done, now.”

He nodded, his lip curled up and his chin tucked hard into his chest.

“Last time,” Bethany promised and her magic flared again.

Fenris bucked, with a grunt and Varric tightened his grip on broad straining shoulders and then…it was over.  The blood flowed through his toes, warming flesh that had been clammy and chilled.  Bethany felt his pulse stir and steady before Sebastian steered her to a chair, “I’m all right, thanks.  Fenris?”

“Yes.”  Their friend’s voice was faint and Varric adjusted the pillows as he moved away to let Aeryn pull up the blankets.  Sebastian steadied Fenris’ hand around the cup of healing potion that Bethany pointed out to him watching carefully, but allowed Fenris to sip it himself.

“And now, you both need to sleep and eat.”  Bethany pointed at them both and made a shooing motion towards Sebastian.  The momentary weakness that had flooded her was fading now, with success flushing her with satisfaction.

Aeryn took his arm to steer him out of the room, but paused to ask, “Are you sure, Beth?  I don’t mind…”

“Go on, Hawke.”  Fenris rasped again and looked pointedly towards Sebastian.

“You stop talking, you’ll ruin your throat.”  Bethany scolded him from over her own teacup.

“You seem to be in good hands, Fenris.”  Varric chuckled.  “I’ll go see what gossip is turning up behind us, alright Hawke?”

“Sure.”  They followed him out of the room and Varric pulled the door to before jogging down the stairs back to the dining room.

She meant to direct Sebastian to their room, but her worry burst out instead.  “I can’t believe the two of you.  I told Varric…told him, oh they’re so sensible, they’re still in Tellend, they wouldn’t have…” her hand flicked in the air, at a loss for words.

He shook his head helplessly and confessed, “I couldn’t stay in Tellend another night.”

“Why?  Good heavens, you’ve spent the night in worse places.  A frozen, ruined stone tower in the middle of a blizzard with a broken door, for one.”  She thumped him on the shoulder in exasperation.

“I couldn’t …I dreamed…I woke up to the bells.  In that robe on a cot in a dormitory…and thought I’d dreamed you.”

“ _Sebastian_ …” She sounded frustrated and he tried to explain.

“You don’t understand…it was.”  Sebastian stopped to clear his throat and Aeryn frowned at him.     I couldn’t stay.”

“Oh, love.”  Her fingers stroked in the hair at his temple, normally smooth but rough, just now, with sweat and lack of care.   “You’ve had worse dreams.”

“No.  I have not.”  He struggled trying to explain the bereft feeling that had lingered even through morning prayers.  He’d been fine up until he’d fallen asleep the next night as they camped and dreamed it again.  Sebastian leaned against the wall and sipped his tea.   She was avoiding the reason they were staying at an inn, instead of the Keep as Cleve had invited.

“What did Varric not tell me?” He asked it casually enough but Sebastian was looking at her down the broken blade of his nose, all the austerity he’d ever learned shielding him from what he knew she had to tell him.  He looked down at the empty cup he’d been turning this way and that in his hands.   And then looked up again.  “Cleve’s daughter?  How bad is it?”

Aeryn rubbed at the tightness between her eyes.  She’d have preferred to have him fed and warmly snugged in bed before having this conversation.  Sebastian was looking at her down the broken blade of his nose, his patience clearly at an end.  All the austerity he’d ever learned shielding him from what he knew she had to tell him.

“She was…less than complimentary,” Aeryn allowed.  “Come here, love.”  He sighed before he turned and slumped tiredly before her.  Aeryn reached up and deftly unbuckled the leather strap that kept the chestplate in place and slid it off of him to set to the side, then went to work on the buckles that closed his surcoat.  “Did you ever find yourself in dire straits here?  She seemed to think you might be looking for someone to stake you.”

“I am in a way, am I not?” He shrugged out of the heavy weight of the fishmail and let it clank lightly as it fell out around his hips.

Aeryn conceded the fact and knelt down to remove his greaves.

“But…no.  I never came this far south.  I tended to stray along the Minanter, as it was easier to get home cheaply on a barge or somewhat.”  She looked up at him, her silk skirts flounced out over her feet.  It was…bizarrely domestic.  Sebastian had the jarring illusion of being depicted in some ugly romantic tapestry the sort of which he’d seen often in upscale brothels; a lady at his feet in service and he returned from the _warres_.  Aeryn lacked only the vapid, mooning expression popular in that sort of art.  He shivered and sat down as quickly as he could, bringing them back on to a level.

Sebastian startled her with his sudden movement, but when he laid his head back against the chair Aeryn reached out and smoothed his hair, still darkly damp with the rain, back from his brow as he stared up at the planked ceiling. “Unless she’s thinking of six years ago, me trying to arrange a coup on my own.  I was…fairly at a loss then.  Maybe she was in Coffrey when I met with the steward who pointed me to the Chantry as a place of refuge, no better than any other beggar.”

She stood fluidly and he watched her as she swayed away, the embroidered bottom of the skirt swishing around her stocking feet, her slippers abandoned somewhere.  Lifting the teapot, she fixed him another cup of tea, with a large dollop of yellow white honey.  He drank it off quickly, wincing around the ache growing in his throat.  “Is this a mistake, _à ruin_?”  She’d sat in the chair and he leaned against her knees, grateful for the support.

“No.  We wouldn’t be here if you hadn’t had some indication that you were needed.   Don’t forget that.  Robard and Cleve, the others you’ve had letters from.”

“The town looks prosperous… what I saw of it.   With what Cleve said, I’d expected it to be foundering.  But it’s grown, it’s practically a city in its own right, now, I’d think.”

“Looks can be deceiving.  There were fine houses rotting along the keep road for lack of inhabitants. But,” she had to be honest with him.  “The merchants are doing well enough to turn away customers if they need to.”

“What did she say?  Zenna.”

Aeryn dropped her eyes.  “Sebastian…”

“Tell me.”

“She asked if the reason you weren’t with us was because you were drunk, or if you’d found a….companion in Tellend you’d decided to take up with.”

“A companion?”

“A whore.  She then asked if you’d promised to use your name to make our mercenary group famous.  She called you a beggar and a…” the words gathered foul on her tongue and Aeryn paused.

“And she called me…”  He pressed her.  He had to know what was being said.

“Love…”

“Am I a boy to be protected or am I the man you’d see a prince?”

She snapped her head up at the bitterness lacing his voice.  After another pause as she searched his face, Aeryn told him.  “A slut…and an oathbreaker.”

She had been right.  His shoulders crumpled as he dropped his head onto his knees.

Aeryn slid off the leather cushion to curl against him.  “It isn’t true.  You were released by the Grand Cleric, herself.”

Her body was warm and solid against him and he clung to the solidity before he answered.  “I know.  My name was stricken as a brother.  It would not have been if there was any question of my oath being still considered valid.”

“But it stings, nonetheless.”  

“More than stings.  Aeryn…you realize the success of this depends on people believing I am the rightful heir.  If it is known that I’m an oathbreaker…”

“It’s not _known_.  She made a judgment based on who you once were, same as when she decided you must be a mere mercenary.  It isn’t true.”

“But I _am_ a mercenary,” he reminded her.

“No, love.  We were.  In Kirkwall, we were.  But then I was made Champion and my companions received a commission of sorts.  You included.  We worked for Alistair at his request, not for coin.  We aren’t mercs and…”

“It’s a fair fine line.”

“And an _important_ one to the people it matters to.”  She traced a pale vine in the carpet with her finger tips.

“That’s why you only came for me on occasion at first. He looked at her and his brows lifted.   Aeryn…did.”  Sebastian closed his hand around her ankle, demanding her attention.  “You started taking more of those jobs for the Viscount…for Meredith, even.  I thought…”

“I took legitimate, sanctioned jobs.”  There was a sharp edge to her voice, though she didn’t raise it at all.  Her fingers curled around his arm.  “We could be called adventurers by the uncharitable.  We could be called special envoys by the pretentious.  But they can’t call you a mercenary and be truthful.”

“You’ve called yourself a mercenary.  And worse.”

“Well, _I_ am.  Was.  No longer.  I haven’t worked for coin alone in…a long time.” 

She was trying to distract him.  Her breast, beneath layers of silk and linen was soft against his arm and the light in her eyes was sweet and soothing to his tired soul.  Distraction was working, he admitted to himself at least, as his fingers found small, intriguing gaps of bare skin along her calf.

“And what is it you work for?” He asked, his voice falling.

Aeryn leaned in to brush a kiss against his temple, the sharp of his cheekbone and the corner of his lip.  He couldn’t help the smile and she kissed that, too.  “That.  That’s what I’ve worked for.  Longer than I care to admit.”

“That is yours by right, _anam chara_.”

“I know it.   _Now_ I know it.”  She knelt up and cupped his jaw in both hands.  “And I know this too, that once the people of Starkhaven meet you, see you.  Know you…they won’t have any doubts that you want the best for them, whether it’s you or Goran.  And… _that_ is princely.  And _that_ , my love, is what you must keep in mind when your history catches up with you.”

Maker he wasn’t worthy of her faith.  He wasn’t.  But…he had it, nonetheless.  “Keep reminding me.”

“My pleasant duty.”  Aeryn nudged his temple with her nose and kissed him again only to pull back in dismay and lay her hands on his forehead, then either side of his throat.  “Oh…you’ve got whatever it is Fenris has come down with, too.”

“I do feel a bit lightheaded.”  Sebastian had to admit.  “Thought I was just starved.”

She got to her feet and pulled him with her.  He bit back a groan as his joints creaked.  “Come on, Varric tracked us down some restoratives.  One of those ought to boost you up enough to keep this to a minimum.  I’ll go see what’s keeping your dinner while you clean up.”

After getting him into their room and pulling out a shimmering bottle of potion, Aeryn left him to his bath and made her way down to the main floor.

Sebastian sat back into the hip bath and let steaming water soak the worst of the stiffness out of his thighs and lower back.  Fenris was heavier than he looked, which wasn’t surprising considering the muscle packed beneath the tattooed skin on the lanky frame.  It had been an awkward journey the last few miles, hauling elf, broadsword, bow and packs.  

The soap was fine and faintly scented in the bracing pine he preferred.  Aeryn must have made some effort to seek it out.  He turned the small ball of pale cream soap in his hand, sudsing it up to smooth over his arms and chest.  

Holy Andraste, he was tired.  Absently, he sipped at the golden brew in the flask Aeryn had placed at his elbow between half-hearted scrubs to his skin with the sponge.  It was surprisingly tasty, spicy and almost green in the aftertaste unlike the too sweet version that Aeryn used to buy from her friend, Elegant.

Not too tired to close his eyes and feel Aeryn’s presence close by, though.  She’d slept in this room while they were apart, he could smell the lingering scent of her in the air.  He took another swallow of potion, feeling invigorating tingles unfurling in his stomach as he poured a pitcher of cooling water over his hair.

The way she’d smiled at him, as if she’d been as happy to see him as he’d been to see her.  All bright warmth and open affection.  He’d dreamed of that smile, that public display of her love, written on her face.

He’d never quite believed he’d ever see it outside of private moments.   He heaved himself up with a prayer of thanks.  

It was easier to stand out of the tub than it had been to sit down but even though the fast fire had thrown warmth into the room, the comfort was fading.  The shallow bath and potion hadn’t quite cast off the chill of snow in his bones and, shivering, Sebastian grabbed clothes just as a knock at the door alerted him to the presence of an appetizing smell of broth and bread.

000000

Almost to the kitchen, Aeryn pulled up when she spied Laida hauling a tray laden with soup and toast up the servant’s stairs.

“So sorry, messere.  I believed that lazy Cassie had brought this right behind you.  She was flirting with the vegetable boy in the courtyard, the tramp.”

Behind Laida, in a mirror placed so that the staff could watch for customers and stay out of their way, Aeryn saw the Starkhaven couple and their servant with their head bent over something on one of the larger tables, now that the dining room had nearly emptied.

“It’s fine.”  She thought a moment.  Varric had come back down.  He might be able to hear, but he couldn’t get as close as she could.  “Take the tray up, if you don’t mind.  Just knock on their doors and leave it on that table?”

“Of course.”

Aeryn waited until Laida had turned her back to step into the heavy shadow pooling around the wall.

It took longer than she expected to maneuver herself around the wall and into one of the small alcoves, close enough to hear.  She didn’t want to interrupt them.  Ah.  Varric was at the bar but he was definitely too far away to get any details.  

There were still a few diners, probably those staying in the inn’s smaller rooms, without sitting areas.  A group was playing cards right next to the Gert and Gerry’s table, and Aeryn had to concentrate to separate the convivial chatter of their conversation to catch the intentionally low hum of the Starkhaveners.

“I know we told you you would be allowed, Ifren.  But surely you see it’s impossible now?”

“I only wish, with your permission, to inquire…”

“We will send a note in the morning.  But we simply must take the coach to Ansburg at eight bells and there is no way you could be there and back by that time.”

“If I leave tonight… _please_ , Mistress.”

“That is the end of it.  Go and draw baths, you ingrate.  We could have let them take you as well, easy as not.” Gerry’s whisper was harsh enough to draw eyes away from their cards at the next table and he covered by taking a sip from his tumbler.

Ifren drew up as if he’d been slapped.  “Of course, messere” he replied stiffly.

As he passed her hiding place, he whispered.  “Better you had.  Better a slave along with them than not knowing at all.”

The two humans seemed to share a moment of relief, sipping their drinks and not meeting the other’s eyes.  Well and done with, their postures said.  Gert glanced up the stairs and her mouth tightened severely before she waved her hand at the barmaid.

Disappointed, Aeryn gathered herself to slide back out of the shadows, expecting them to withdraw.  But Gert ordered a bottle of red wine and the barmaid hurried off.

They didn’t speak even after they’d tested the wine the maid brought and found it to their liking.  Only long, old habit and a niggling curiosity kept Aeryn still.

She watched as Varric sidled over to the card game, bringing a small bottle of something amber along with him.  In a few minutes, he’d been invited to join the next hand as small glasses were set out.

With the clink of glass momentarily distracting everyone with in hearing, Aeryn took the chance to pad out of her alcove.

Just as she was about to leave the room entirely the card game erupted in laughter at something Varric said and Gerry asked his sister,

“D’you think they’re alive, maybe?” Aeryn ducked back behind a heavy tapestry curtaining the doorway between the dining room and the hall.  Almost too far away, she had to concentrate to hear them, getting the gist if not every word.

She shook her head, sending her topaz earrings swinging.  “I don’t.  That… elf at the pier was off her head.  And…Ifren wandering … woods?” she scoffed unkindly.  “… weed the gardens when we were children.  … doing him a favor, keeping him.”

“Will you … note, then?”

“To where?  And…good heavens do you think wild elves can read?”  Her voice went sharp enough for Aeryn to hear every word.

“No.  I suppose you’re right.”   Gerry mumbled something else, muffled into his drink.

They settled into their respective cups again.

“I cannot blame him.  I’d like to go home and pretend everything is the way it was.”

“We can’t.  Gerry…I can’t.”  She leaned forward and Aeryn narrowed her eyes, reading the woman’s lips.  “I can’t go back to that house. Not after Baylen…”  Gert broke off, dropping her head and Gerry reached out to touch his sister’s hand.  Between her dark glove, the lace edge of the silken charcoal bell of her sleeve had ridden up, revealing three deep, ragged red scars running down the sharp edge of her arm, where the bone made a ridge in her flesh.   

He drew her sleeve back down to cover them.  “No, of course not, Gert.   _Nighean_ , I’m sorry.  We’ll go to Ansburg and enjoy the Tourney.”

They fell quiet again before murmuring between sips and Aeryn twitched inwardly, trying to hear.  A few more dribs of their conversation and she might garner enough information to…

A light scent of fir alerted her just before Sebastian’s hand dropped on the back of her neck, the weight of it warm and solid on sensitive skin, sending her eyes wide and the whole of her sensory awareness narrowing to the few inches of her nape.  The heat seemed to sink in as his thumb stroked, repetitively, on the tendon.  Aeryn had to fight not to lean into the pressure, as his petting continued, not to close her eyes in pleasure as Sebastian found that one spot that...

_Sod_ , she’d lost the conversation under the hum from the rest of the room.  Aeryn sighed and looked up at Sebastian.  He’d been waiting for it, his eyebrows lifting in a question.  Feverish, his eyes seemed lyrium bright.  Heat was radiating off of him.  She opened her mouth to insist he return to bed.

“I am fine,” he interrupted the thought.  “But, if your business is concluded?”  His voice was rumbly and low and it tugged at her, seductive as the touch itself.  

Gert and Gerry were still conversing but Sebastian’s hand tightened even further just short of pinching, forcing her to swallow a gasp. Aeryn took a chance and pushed the curtain back, just a hair.  Varric had seen them; the bastard was smirking as he raised a finger agreeingly at her raised eyebrow.

Sebastian stepped away, but his hand didn’t leave her, sliding down her spine to settle possessively in the small of her back as she turned, gentle pressure steering her away from her hiding place behind the thick curtain and up the stairs.  When they reached the first landing, far enough from the other patrons not to be heard, Aeryn said, “I’m sorry.  That Starkish couple was back again and I was trying to…”

Sebastian stepped her into a wall and bent down to kiss her, his body heat suffusing the air around them in warmth.  He tasted of the small ale and chicken soup that Laida had been hauling earlier.

It was a hard kiss and she had to gulp air when they parted. “Sebastian, aren’t you…”

“No.”  He took her mouth again and heat engulfed her.  This time, Aeryn curved into it, into him, burying her fingers in the lush curls that brushed his neck.  A hint of woodsmoke clung to him, from the towel that had warmed near the fire.

His fingers slipped into the gap of lacing between her thin bliaut and the kirtle and tugged at the ribbons, stroking up as he drew her up the last few stairs to the wide hall between the rooms.

There was a light under the door to the room her sister had taken Fenris to.  She should check on them ag…Sebastian lifted her hand to his mouth and lightly bit the swell of her palm.

Aeryn gathered her scattering thoughts, “Love…You’re sick…”  Maker’s Breath, he was _barefoot_.

“I missed you, _à ruin_.”  Sebastian said it plaintively, sweetly even, the tone completely at odds with the hard thigh he’d just insinuated between hers, pressing up and sending beats of pleasure through her veins.

“Oh, I missed you.”

His mouth was warm on her throat and he purred against her skin.  “I missed this spot under your ear.  An’ this curve of your neck.  And this sweet round of your breast.”  He opened their door behind her and as his lips traced the lacy edge of her bodice, she let him press her back into the darkened room.

“And Maker, I missed your mouth.”  He nibbled slowly along her bottom lip until she sighed and teased him with the quick tip of her tongue making him chuckle before Aeryn nudged, against his teeth, into his mouth slowly, luring a groan out of him as she stroked with her tongue and with the sensitive tips of her fingers up the thick, definite bulge between them.

“Missed that too?”

“Almost the very most,” he agreed.

She freed a hand and stroked his forehead.  He was still hot.  It wasn’t a ravaging fever, but still.  He needed rest.  “You took the draught?”

“I did, I was a good lad, took my medicine and ate my soup.  C’n I unwrap my present now?  All ribbon and bow and pretty wrapping?”  His fingers tightened in the lacing again even as his mouth traced the edge of said ribbon to tug at it with his teeth.

Fragile, the satin unraveled with his toying.  And she unraveled a bit with it.  “Are you drunk?”

“I feel a wee bit tilty, it’s true.  But I’ve not taken a drink.”   He paused, his chuckle rich and dark, “Ah, there’s my _r’un biodagain_ , my wild bird,” as he drew a short, narrow shiv from the improvised sheath in her stays.  It clattered to the floor, followed by another before he purred into her ear, “I knew she was there, somewhere, under the all the fancy decoration.”

He’d slipped into Starkish and Aeryn pulled back to look at him again.  His eyes were too bright and there was a slight tremble to his shoulders under her fingers.  Her hand cupped his jaw and snagged her lip in her teeth.

And he paused suddenly, as he caught the worry in her hesitation.  “Aeryn?”

Fenris would have said if they’d run into real trouble, if the tower had held shades or worse.  She ran a tentative thumb over his cheekbone.  “You’re sure you’re feeling well enough?”

He hummed an affirmative, too busy chasing the feel of her fingers on his sensitized skin to be bothered to nod.

She brushed her finger over his full lower lip and his mouth dropped open even as he swallowed back his response.

The little catching sound set all the nerves in her body on fire.  Sebastian hadn’t moved, the tension between need and wanting her permission holding him, but his eyes were dark and his breathing was fast.  The pulse in his throat leapt.  The way he reacted to the least fond touch was always enthralling, enough to make her want to spend an hour, at least, just watching him beneath her fingers.  They might have time, someday.  As it was, she trailed her fingers down his chest and lifted up the hem of the tunic he’d tugged on before he came to find her.  He obediently lifted his arms and pulled it out of her hands and off the rest of the way to discard the heavy linen over the back of a chair.  

Aeryn splayed her hand in the crisp hair he’d revealed and then dragged her thumbs along the elegant structure of his collarbones to the rounded muscle of his broad shoulders.  His skin was smooth and darkly gold in the firelight, shadows cutting patterns across his lean body.  

“You’re a treasure,” she told him and the hectic flush on his cheekbones deepened.  Sebastian closed his eyes for a moment.

“Am I?” The catch in his voice and the fragile flutter of his dark lashes tugged at her heart.  She hated his family, so very much.  But she slammed the lid on the eager black thought to reassure him, cupping his face, so dear, in her hands.

“Best I ever stole.”

Solemnity burned through the fog of fever and desire that had built so quickly as he’d bathed, that had made him so desperate to find her, to reassure himself. “You never stole me, _mo chridhe_.  I followed my heart to your side of my own free will.”

The knot in her throat was completely inappropriate and Aeryn swallowed past it.  “Come here.”

“Yes?” He smiled delightedly,the solemn moment before all but abandoned, and she couldn't help but grin back.

“Always yes.”

He dropped to his knees and pressed a kiss to the silk covering her thighs, making her giggle as his hands underneath her skirts slid up the stockings again.  Sheer silk on the front, but his sensitive fingers sought out the ovals of bare skin between the lacy edges and the ribbon bows.

He found the opening just behind her knees and his fingers twitched, buckling her even as she caught herself on his shoulders and he tightened his hold on her thighs.  “Pull up your skirts.”  He ordered and Aeryn obeyed, sliding the silk and linen skirts up in a rustle.  “I’m a bit fond of these new stockings of yours.”

“I’d not have guessed.”  She managed a dry tone even as his grip on her thighs shifted up to her arse, fingers tickling through linen and silk.

Groaning, Sebastian took hold properly, filling his hands with smooth muscle and the fine rounded shape, tilting her slightly and she had to admire the flexibility as he mouthed up the smooth column of her leg, deftly unbuckling the sheathe for her knife, only to stop at the edge of the fine chemise, the heavily embroidered border of the material pooling on the bridge of his nose.  “I think this is the most clothing I’ve ever seen you wear.”

Aeryn giggled at the frustration in his voice.  “I can probably do something about that.”  She pulled the last bow that tightened the laces on her sides and the heavy watered silk kirtle puddled around her ankles, draping over Sebastian like a hooded cloak.

“Oh, aye. This is much better.” He muttered from underneath the dark covering.

“Daft.”  Aeryn tugged her arms out of the white linen bliaut and it followed the other to the floor, as Sebastian rocked back on his heels to divest himself of the first.

When he looked back up at her, there was only the aqua silk chemise between them, slit up the sides to reveal the swell of her hips and the lace bodice clinging to her breasts.  He reached out to stroke his fingers down her stomach, enjoying the difference between the material and the taut muscle beneath.  And dark triangle of her mound just visible under the thin silk.  “You are so very lovely.”

“Fine feathers.” Aeryn murmured trying to be nonchalant against the blatant want in his touch, thick in his voice.

“You’re the loveliest woman I’ve ever seen were you wearing naught but sacking and ashes or blood and leather as usual.”

“You really like it?”

He sat up on his knees and murmured, “I…”  He was about to show her how very much he liked it when it occurred to him where he was.  

On his knees, about to say, “I do.”

His swirling head, aching just a little under the more primal urge to strip her bare and have her on the carpet, cleared.  Why not?  Why wait?  Why should he not be able to clasp that hand of hers in public and proclaim it?  He had plans and plans, it was true.  But this… it felt right.  He could almost hear Aveline and Alistair, whispering in his ear, worrying over him waiting too long.  Now.

“Aeryn?”

“Hmm.”

“I’ve a confession to make.”

“Oh.”  He could see the bewilderment flash across her face as his tack changed.  “Beyond my stockings, then?”

“I…may have…put the cart before the horse, a bit, in Tellend.”

Had he bought a…no, he was meaning somewhat else.  “How so?”

“I’ve mentioned to more than one person…that…you were my betrothed.”

Only long, careful training kept her voice from squeaking out.  “Did you, now?”   _Oh_.

“And then, I dreamed badly, in Tellend.  I woke thinking I’d dreamed you up.  That I was still in the Chantry.  It…I was fair upset, _leannan_. I…really prefer not...”  Sebastian stopped, ashamed of the way his voice shook.  He wasn’t a boy.  There was nothing to fear between them.  “I don’t want to be a liar, anymore.  And I do not want to be without you, ever again.“

Aeryn sank down the wall to kneel with him, halting the tumble of his words.  “I’ve a confession of my own.”

“Just now?”   He didn’t whine.

Aeryn nodded, the hard oak beneath her knees grounding her.  “I think you’ll like it.  I may have been calling you my betrothed, too.  Once or twice.” She tipped her head to the side.  “I know you don’t want me to lie…about us.  I…just.”  She smiled at him, trying to keep her lips from trembling.  “It didn’t feel like a lie when I said it.”

She watched his pulse speed up in his long brown throat, before he swallowed.  “Then…shall we make it true?  Will you marry me, Aeryn Hawke?”

There was a part of her brain telling her to make sure, to ask, to clarify he was sure he wanted her.  All of her.  And a bleak part of her heart that mocked the very thought of it, a pickpocket and a murderer married to this fine, sweet, _good_ man.

She forced both foolish ideas back.  

He wasn’t some stranger, swept off his feet by a lie or a misconception.  He was Sebastian and he’d seen…if not all then quite a lot of the worst of her.

He loved her.

And, oh, she loved him.  And surely, that was what mattered just now.

Sebastian would admit, after the last year, with Aeryn here on her knees before him, telling him she’d been proclaiming their suit herself…he did feel fairly confident.  But, for just a moment, Aeryn’s face went still as marble. Her fingers cold and strong and her eyes; wide and vulnerable and, _Holy Maker_ , so afraid that his heart took a strange throb at the trace of old festering fear burning across her face like a comet, foretelling grief.

But before he could open his mouth to argue against what ever evil thing she was thinking, Aeryn smiled at him again, that rare, brilliant smile that she’d greeted him with, her fingers curling in his.

“Yes, I will, Sebastian Vael.”

She ducked her chin but the shyness was fleeting.  Aeryn launched herself at Sebastian and he only just caught her as she knew he would, her hands in his hair and her body pressed flagrantly against his, the thin material slippery and riding up between them as her thighs parted and she wrapped her legs around his waist.

Her mouth was soft, though, and Sebastian kissed her carefully, twining their tongues and letting his fingers trace the edge of her collarbones, the round of her ribs and down the fine, solid bones of her sinuous backbone to lodge his thumbs in her dimples.  His.  Made for him and set in his path.

Her own mind must have echoed the thought.  Aeryn hummed low in her throat, her fingers tightening in his hair.  She pulled back and glared at him, “My love.  Mine.”  As if she sought to warn him.

“And no other’s.”  He swore it happily and kissed her again, rocking back on his heels and lifting her.

He _was_ feeling the effects of his long hike and the cold, Aeryn realized a bit late as Sebastian staggered a little under her weight and pressed her to the wall, air forcing out of her lungs.  She could feel his ribs heave between her thighs.   “Sebastian,”  Aeryn asked as she felt him try to adjust.  Her fingers dug into his shoulders. “The bed?“  There, she could…but he cut her thoughts off with a growl and desire welled up; sharp, messy, and insistent as blood in a fresh cut as he dragged his off hand up her back to cup her skull, his hand between her recklessness and the brick cornice.

She could feel it, in his body and the low rumble of his voice; hunger and a desire to possess.  But that careful hand behind her skull drove away the last of her worry.  

She might not need his protection, but it was hers anyway.  

“Maker help me…I need t’bury myself in you.  I need the scent of you on my skin, the taste of you until I forget where I begin and you end.”  He traced along her neck, sucking and teeth grazing below her ear and Aeryn leaned her head back, any reluctance long fled, pressing delicate skin to his devouring touch.

Sebastian shifted his arm to hold her against him as he undid the laces at his waist, the trousers falling loosely off his hips as he bent forward, opening his mouth over one peaked nipple, suckling through the wispy material until she had to gasp again.  The fabric muted his tongue, but not the heat of his mouth and the wet lace rasped across her sensitive skin.  Another movement and he cupped his hand against her mound, grinning at the slick heat he found between her thighs.  He curled his fingers, cunningly tracing her edges with his thumb.  “All this for me?”  A second later he was licking her flavor from his fingertips.

In the dim room, his eyes were dark but now and again the firelight would flare and catch sulfur blue sparks that sent shivers through her.  His fingers taunting her, his mouth on her breast sending aching lines of want to pulse low in her belly.  Shifting again, Aeryn slid down his body just enough to feel his cock tease her entrance.    

“No other.”  She promised, clasping her legs around his lean hips as he thrust home.  He’d shaved, the skin along his jaw was soft as sueded silk as she nuzzled, then licked with a flicking tongue.  So hot, she felt like her skin _was_ pleasantly dissolving against his as his fever, her own desire burning from the inside, made her sweat, sealing their skin together between the chill of the brick and the fever radiating from his back.

“Ah, Maker.  Aeryn…” Holding her still for a moment, Sebastian reeled as Aeryn nibbled along his jawline.  The silk stockings rasped against his sides, her foot pressing in counterbalance against his arse.

There was violence under his skin, urging him to harsher desires, but Aeryn made a small contented sound in his ear as she settled around him.  As if she felt as safe here, trapped between the strength of his body and the cold brutality of fired brick as another woman might in her parlor.  He hugged her tightly, the weight of her trust light in the wake of what they’d just decided.  “I love you, so.”

Aeryn smiled against his cheekbone.  “And I love you.”  Right before she nipped his earlobe, sending a jolt down to his cock.  “ _Move_ , for Void’s sake.”

“Oh, yes.”  He rocked into the cradle of her hips.  Small movements meant to keep them in constant contact, never losing the exquisite sensation of fullness and soft, surrounding heat.  Sebastian mouthed along the curve of her ear and down the line of her neck, exulting in the bright flush that spread across her chest. Aeryn spread her thighs out wide and shifted her hips to pull him in closer, one calf hooked over his hip and the other tight around his waist.  “I…yours…I’m yours,” he swore against her skin as he rolled his spine and surged into the welcome of her body, again.

“Promise…”

“Always…”  The hand that wasn’t cushioning her head trailed down her arm and grasped her hand, tightly when her fingers laced into his.   

And then there was only the huff of breath and whine, the slick sound of their bodies until a cry wrenched itself from him to be buried against her throat as her body quivered around him, a keen forcing itself through her teeth and his knuckles ground against the brick, completion tortioning her into a clean arc and her thighs crushing against his hips.

They panted together, firelight flickering off of their sweat-sheened skin.  Sebastian wanted to collapse to the wooden planks, his legs shaking violently under him.  But he managed to kick off his trousers and make the six steps to the bed to sit down.  Aeryn kissed him again, gently now, a giving sweetness in the way she brushed his mouth with her own.  She felt cool against his skin and he clutched her, trembling as sweat dripped down his spine.                                    

Her fingers traced the dampness on his skin.  “Oh, good.  Your fever broke.”

Sebastian huffed a laugh as he sprawled backwards on the wool-stuffed mattress beneath them.  “That’s not all I’ve broken, I think.”

Aeryn grin was scampish as she traced her finger along the shaft of his still half hard cock, “I think you’ll recover.”  Snorting as he twitched under her hand, sucking in a hoarse breath.

After skimming the silk chemise off over her head and pushing off the stockings that were now bunched around her knees,  Aeryn patted him down, checking for any injury that needed tending.  Her tongue clicked disapprovingly as her fingers slid past his ribs.  She slid off the bed and he heard her, rummaging in their kits for something and lit a candle to set beside the bed before the mattress dipped and she sat again.  There was a sticky sound of her hands rubbing together before she began to daub almond cream on the nasty bruise that he’d taken trying to rig a tarp over the tower’s broken door.  She hummed a soft tune as she worked, and had he not been so tired he might have asked for a song.  Just once, he’d like to hear her.  Just once.

Finally, with a sigh, Aeryn rearranged herself to curl against his side, and Sebastian stirred enough to roll over to meet her.  His arm wrapped securely around her, she laid her head into the hollow of his shoulder, content for the moment to breathe in rhythm with him, hand pressed against the slightly rapid beat of his heart.

“You’ll marry me?”  Sebastian asked a moment later, rubbing his cheek against the top of her head.

“I will.”  She hesitated before she asked very quietly.  “When?”

“I have a place and a time in mind, if that’s alright?”

“Oh.   Yes, it’s fine.”

“Soon though.”  He assured her, reaching to trace the edge of her rounded hip bone.

“Oh.  I’d…best make arrangements then?”  His hand came up to cup her chin, bringing her to meet his eyes.  The fever broken, they were light and soothingly warm again, easy to fall into and the small panic that had bubbled up at the idea of all that might need doing fled.

“Before we leave Priden.  If there’s anything you want for me to include, you’ll tell me?”

She shrugged, “So long as Varric, Bethany and Fenris are with us to witness…”

“I’ll not leave our friends out.  I think they’ll be happy for us.”

“Then I’ll leave it to you.  I’m sorry…I…didn’t know what to…”  She swallowed but she continued on, her fingers tangling with his, stroking and relying on touch to convey that she wasn’t reluctant. “I just never thought enough about it.  I mean…yes, being married.  I…I’ve thought about that a lot.  Being married to you.”

There was a soft dreamy quality to her voice and Sebastian tightened his arm around her.  

“But the actual…ah…getting married part?” she chuckled, ruefully, “Well, not so much.”

“I’ve thought it out enough, I think, for the both of us.”  He reassured her, though the fact that she’d thought at least about the _being_ married was comforting.  “I’ve seen a fair few of them, you know.”

“Yes, I’d imagine.”  She pressed her nose against his jaw again, settling herself with the rich male scent of his skin.  “I’ve only ever been to Aveline’s since I left Ferelden.  It was nice though.”

Her friends, for the most part, not being the marrying sort.  And the nobles of Kirkwall hadn’t likely invited her.  He smiled in the dark as her cool toes rubbed against his leg.  “It was.  Though since it was your estate, I’d thought you’d have…”

“I just handed her the key and told her to tell Bodahn and Orana what she needed.  And…” Aeryn snorted, “I think she handed both off to Donnic, now that I recall.”

“It was he who came to the Chantry to arrange things.”  His smile spread to a lazy smile, remembering Donnic coming to beg his help to make the decisions.

Aeryn picked up Sebastian's hand from where it had returned to massaging patterns on her hip and traced the graceful lines of it. They were quite large, strong but narrow for their size. Long fingers and neat, square, blunt nails. Despite the calluses, the hard won marks of his archer's skill, the scars, Aeryn could have marked him as a noble simply by the elegance of his hands. Dusted with cinnamon hair and a scattering of darker freckles. Her thumb rested on the knuckle of his ring finger, flicking back and forth.  “I _did_ help Aveline.  With one thing.”

Donnic had worn the ring they chose every day, trusting his gloves and gauntlet to keep it from interfering.  Aveline wore hers too, the beautifully simple hammered rose gold band that Donnic had given her.  They all wore charmed baubles, for one reason or another, though Sebastian had never taken a ring when she’d offered them.

Maybe he would.  Now.

"Would you wear a ring, a wedding ring, I mean?" she asked in that faint voice of hers that he’d learned to weigh heavy and Sebastian blinked aware from his tumble into muzzy, love-dazed relaxation.  “If I gave it?"

"Of course." His grandfather had worn a smooth silverite wedding band. His father, too, though his had born a dark blue sapphire to match the one his mother wore. "Did your own father not?"

“No.”

Sebastian rubbed her silky hair between his fingers, waiting through the silence that followed.  Regretting bringing Malcolm Hawke into this, too, if he were honest.  Finally, she shook her head against him.  "No. Too much chance it could get hung on something when he was working. Mother only wore hers after the work was done or if we went to town.  Well, until we came to Kirkwall."

Casting back, Sebastian recalled the slender, plain gold ring Leandra had worn to services.   It had been a bright gleam on her finger, never abandoned even in the depths of their poverty, though… he remembered, too, that she’d shifted it to her right hand, just before she’d been killed.  Someone had replaced it, before her funerary pyre had been lit.  He shook himself mentally, trying to listen to Aeryn, instead.

"And too, he thought that if he wasn't wearing a ring if he was ever caught...maybe no one would look for Mother and find Bethany.  It wouldn’t occur to a Templar, I think.  That he might have been married."  She pushed aside the melancholic thought and leaned up on her arms to look at him fully.  “It’s just before...you were worried about a favor throwing your aim.”

His lips tipped up shy and sweet. “Aye.  But this is a bit more permanent than any favor, isn’t it?”

“Such is the meaning of permanent.”  

She was looking a little dazed herself now, and he rose up on his elbows to nuzzle her lips softly before he whispered, "So I'll get used to it _and never_ take it off."  She met him to trade a slow, lingering kiss.

A few moments later he asked, “Have you something in mind, then?  For me to wear?”  

Her dimple popped up and she patted his chest.  ”I just might.  You’ll have to wait and see.”

"Not long,” he said it again, just to see her eyes widen in the moonlight streaming across them.

"Well, then, I’ll have to case out that jeweler the dressmaker told me about, tomorrow, too."  She kissed the corner of his lips and he’d started to nudge her mouth open when it occurred to him.

"You will _pay_ for the ring, now?"  

Aeryn kissed him, instead of answering.

He yawned, coughing, and she pulled back.  “Poor sweetheart.  You really should get some sleep.”

“Stay with me, though.”  He murmured as she turned in his arms and he snuggled her against him, the firm curve of her arse settling into the hollow of his thighs, her head under his chin, their hands tucked together under the round of her breasts.

“Always.”

Aeryn closed her eyes, reviewing the memory of him on his knees before her with her hands clasped in his.  Her stomach fluttered, as her guilty conscience tried to remind her of all the reasons she shouldn’t be here.

_Not tonight._

He felt her shift against him, her breath regular but the electricity of her body still stirring, crackling under her skin.  She had spoken of rings.  And even if she hadn’t seen it for sure, Sebastian hadn’t forgotten.   _I want to see what you have in that little box,_ she’d whispered as she tucked it into the front of his tunic on that frigid day in Ferelden.  He cleared his throat, rasping a little when he whispered, “I have something for you.  In that little leather box, you might remember.”

Red leather, worked in copper with a high copper count brass hinge and catch and barely two inches square.  Not expensive, but well made.  Kept in the buttoned pocket in the bottom of his favorite pack when they were camped and in the secret compartment in his quiver when they were travelling. “I remember.”   

Not that she’d _looked_ or anything.  Just to make sure they had everything.  Once.  Or maybe twice.  She hadn’t looked _in_ the box.  Didn’t count as sneaking if she hadn’t looked.

“But…” he brought her hand to his lips, to kiss her finger with its delicate tattoo.  “You won’t mind if I save it until the ceremony?”

“No…I don’t mind.”

His jaw cracked with a yawn and Sebastian felt his tenuous hold on wakefulness slide. “Th’s good.  G’ night, _à ruin_.”

A few moments later Sebastian was breathing deeply, his light snore burring.  Reassured by his presence and the thought of that delicate little box that he’d kept so long like a treasure, Aeryn drifted off to the solid thump of Sebastian’s steady heartbeat.   


	35. Chapter 35

In the next room, Bethany stood from her chair to check on Fenris one last time.  He was snoring heavily, his sinuses clogged.  She added a handful of camphor to the brazier to help and touched the kettle, gingerly.  It was still hot enough, so she poured a cupful of water and measured out another dose of mint and horehound for his throat.  Even if he didn’t wake to drink it warm, it would help.  

She padded carefully around the room.  She wasn’t as naturally silent as Aeryn, but the years of sneaking in the Circle had taught her the tricks of being unobtrusive.  She poured herself a cup, as well.  The brew was medicinal, to be sure, but with a bit of honey it was drinkable and soothing.  Settling down on her bed, she leaned against the folded blankets and watched him.  

Fenris turned over in his bed, snuffling into his pillow.  His hands, vulnerable and elegant without the heavy gauntlets protecting them, were splayed out like starfish and dark against the inn’s white linens.  His markings still glowed faintly silver and, oddly, pale green with the residual trace of the magic she’d had to use.  

She’d hurt him.  It was so _strange_.  Heartbreaking to hurt someone when you were trying to heal and to watch him bite back curses, because he’d known she was being careful. Doing her best.

The one time Aeryn had spoken of what had been done to Fenris, Bethany had been able to see the fury that lashed behind her sister’s eyes.  It had been there again, tonight, while she braced his legs as Bethany worked.  

And for the first time, Bethany understood it, why her sister was so angry about this, at least.  

Such a perversion.  What had he been like, before?

Dark-haired, she thought.  His eyebrows and his lashes were black as corbie wings.  Sometimes, like tonight when he was ill, his skin turned sallow and yellow around the markings as if they leached the poison of lyrium into his body and sucked the warmth out of his skin.  

His sister had been a mage, he’d told her on the ship as they crossed the Waking Sea.  Varania.  He’d said the name with bitter hurt and bewilderment lacing his voice.  His sister, yet she’d led the magister who’d done this to him right to his prey.  

For power.  

How could she?  Bethany gripped the cup in her hands, the bones of her hand creaking against the clay.  There was no power in the world great enough to make her even consider turning on Aeryn like that.  Aeryn who had, apparently, done nothing her whole life but protect Bethany.  Even at the worst, when she’d been so furious at Aeryn’s inability to save Carver, save their mother...it would never have occurred to her to purposely betray her sister.  

And he’d killed her for it.  

Maker...Bethany couldn’t blame him.  What else could he have done?  Though she _was_ surprised, knowing Aeryn’s proclivities, that she hadn’t done it for him.

She’d missed so much.  In the tower, living her narrow little life, trying to stay safe and reach for just enough to keep going.  Her students.  Cullen.  She whispered a prayer for them, under her breath.   _Andraste, keep your eye on them._  She’d like to light the shelf of candles for them, let herself be soothed by the ritual.  Maybe she could ask Sebastian about having a small altar in the house Aeryn and Varric were renting.  Or maybe, once the Bann had returned it would be safe to go to the Chantry herself.

A narrow life.  Was this any less narrow than the Circle?  Was she any good to anyone, playing at nurse?  She wasn’t a healer...but that’s where she kept finding herself.  Anders had once tried to explain how he’d done it...stretched his thoughts out until he found the spark of warmth, the Fade spirit that could guide his hand, show him the way to lift out illness, to travel the nerves and sinew of another being and set it all right, again.

She couldn’t do it.  Everytime she tried, tried to walk a path in the wind of the Fade that opened to her, the road snarled with thorns and bindweed and led her to demons, not spirits.  Demons that laughed and flared and circled until she…

Bethany opened her eyes, slamming the trunk in her mind.  

She had to stop. _Stop reaching for gifts you don’t have, little bird.  The ones the Maker gave you are enough._ Malcolm’s voice rumbled in her memory.   _Yes, well.  It would have been nice, Father, if you’d taught Aeryn not to over-reach her mortality right along with it._

_But that would have been against the point, wouldn’t it?  Maker, Father what did you do?_

Fenris still glowed faintly in the dark, but the sickly green was gone even as he heaved a wheezing wet cough.  He’d grumbled about the goosegrease on his chest, but she thought it was helping to break up the congestion.  He’d smeared it himself, snagging the small jar from her with a quick hand, turned away from her and hunched in.  She’d turned away to allow him the privacy, only to have his sticky-slick fingers run down hers when she came back to the bed with a flannel cloth to lay over.  She’d pressed the flannel over the grease without meeting his eyes.  She should have joked or something to set him at ease...but.    

Sometimes it was hard not to be bitter, when Aeryn and Fenris spoke in their shorthand and left so much unsaid, but seemed to understand each other implicitly as they’d done earlier.  Although she realized they’d been talking about her, somehow.   They’d blinked and flicked fingers like a whole conversation.  It was almost like…

Carver.  She’d once been able to talk to Carver, just like that.  A lift of eyebrows and a wrinkled nose and it had been like sharing thoughts, though Father had said it wasn’t really possible to share someone’s thoughts.

Is that what Aeryn and Fenris were, like enough to be twins?  He’d sold himself into something worse than slavery for a chance for his family to be free.  Would Aeryn have done the same?

Had she?  Working for Meeran had been Aeryn’s choice. Bethany had done very little once Aeryn had proved her worth.  

Leandra had insisted, once they realized how many Templars roamed the Kirkwall streets.  And Aeryn had agreed, though Meeran had still ordered Bethany out.  Somehow Aeryn had gotten him to agree to support roles for her.  Healing, especially once the elvhen healer that had been part of the Red Iron when they joined had disappeared one night.  Very rarely had Bethany been allowed on offense, and only in large groupings where she could stand on the high ground and pick off enemies.

No wonder, trapped with Mother for days on end in Gamlen’s dark hovel, that Bethany had dreamed of Mother’s more frequent tales of the days when she’d been the darling of Hightown and the exciting, free life her own sister was pursuing.

So she’d prodded and poked at her sister, the gap between them widening with every night job and every push.   Aeryn had shut down farther, withdrawing the easy affection she’d once shared.  Bethany had thought she’d been ashamed of her when Aeryn would lash out, now and again with the sharp edge of her humor.  

She still remembered Fenris’ bitter words and Aeryn’s cruel agreement.  Neither of them thought of her that way now, of course.  Would it change if she stopped being able to help them when they limped home from a fight?

No, of course not.  They’d been sick.  Not physically...well, maybe physically, too.  Anders had healed things in them that he’d never bothered to tell them about and even if she’d not been able to do it herself, Bethany had seen it happen.  He’d not been able to keep himself from fixing injury where he found it and maybe they’d never realized.   But anyone watching them would have seen it.  They climbed back up out of their darkness together, each using the other for a support.  

Did it ever bother Sebastian, that odd closeness?  But he’d had years to watch it develop.  And he was Fenris’ friend, besides being Aeryn’s lover.  And, as Aeryn said, there was a light in Sebastian.  It was hard to imagine him jealous.

She should ask him, sometime.  

Fenris was moving again and she caught the sheen on his skin in the flicker of light from the brazier.  Sweat.   _Thank the Maker_.

His hand grasped about, searching for a blanket that had fallen to the other side of the bed.  Bethany set her empty cup aside to stand and shake the woolen coverlet out before she draped it over his lithe form.  He’d warned her not to touch him while he slept, so she didn’t chance too close.   

Sweat was good.  If he was sweating, the fever must have broken and Bethany swallowed back a sigh of relief.  Illness scared her, as weak as her skills were against them.  Potions only went so far.  

He shivered, even under the extra layer.  She couldn’t let him take a chill now.  Taking up the iron poker beside the small hearth, she prodded the logs back into glowing life and added a good thick chunk of applewood.  Movement outside the window caught the corner of her eye and Bethany turned to watch as an elf, stocky or perhaps just better bundled than the hard-head in the bed next to her, made his way out of the bricked courtyard and into the street.

Her own yawn caught her by surprise before she could smother it behind a hand.   

From beneath the pile of blanket and pillow came a gruff voice, “Go to sleep, Bethany.  If you’ll stop thinking so loudly, I will try not to expire before a decent hour of daylight."

“Promise?”  She tucked her feet under her own blanket and turned on her side.  The soft wool squished beneath her, enveloping her in warmth and she stretched her tired feet, still aching from the long march days before.  She could just see the clear green gleam of Fenris’ eyes reflecting light like a cat’s from within the opening he’d made to breathe, his hand snaking out to catch the rim of the clay mug she’d set within his reach earlier.

“I promise.”  

000000

Sebastian blinked awake to find Aeryn stretching few feet away in a puddle of sunshine, balanced on her forearms with her legs arched over her back, nearly touching the back of her head.  She looked as though someone had dipped her in gold, with the light catching the fine hairs that turned her skin peachy.

Even after their night…perhaps because of it and all that restless energy still needed directing.  She was unnervingly still, her eyes fixed on some infinitesimal spot on the brick wall.  He could see the traces of his need livid across her body; a bite blazed on her throat, faint dark marks scattered on her hips.

He could feel her answers written on his own skin when he stretched his hands over his head and his toes over the foot of the bed.  He smelled satisfyingly of her almond cream and the sharp steel scent of her sweat.  And rather pungently of camphor and sex, he realized as his lower spine popped.

He’d waked in the night, coughing, and she’d smoothed a layer of camphorated goosegrease across his chest and back and pressed  flannel over the mess.  He’d drawn her back to him, the chord struck by her gentle care chiming into a slow burning need.  Aeryn had pressed him back to the pillows and proceeded to ride him into oblivion, the medicine slick between them and tingling in the ends of sensitive nerves.

He paused in midstretch to push at that thought, wait for the shame that had once rushed to fill in the eddy such a realization would leave in its wake. He'd reached for a bottle or a body more than once to fill it for him, before his twentieth birthday.

There was no shame, this morning, though. Only the lingering ember of the smiles Aeryn had for him, the sweet sighs, the trust she'd given him when he promised to love her.  She didn't doubt his word.

For her, he wasn't faithless.  Nor less, an oathbreaker.  And, watching her, being with her...it was enough to make him believe it as well.

All in all, a much better morning than he’d had lately.  Yesterday, he’d woken to Fenris swearing and in short work, had Fenris’ feet planted in his stomach, rubbing for all he was worth, to keep the blood flowing in stiff toes.  

He watched her flow into a different position, legs splayed in splits.

“You’ve misplaced a fair few of your bones again, _bain ribhinn”_

“All where you left them last night, I swear.”  Aeryn lowered her body until she was balanced a breath above the rug, fluid and easy.

She rolled back, sitting up on her shins then continuing the movement up and over, in a full backbend.

“Mayhaps your clothes as well.”  Not that he was complaining, but he did have hopes of seeing at least the more delicate garments sometime in the future.

“Again, all where you left them.  Scattered hither and yon.”  Aeryn pushed up and was suddenly standing and sitting beside him on the bed.  Her hand was cool against his forehead and he allowed her to check his temperature before he nudged up into her caress.

Aeryn sighed in relief.  He was still bed-warm, but the hectic flush on hSebastian’s cheekbones was gone and he seemed to be breathing easier.  Fenris had been on his way to recovery, as well, when she’d poked her head in earlier.  He’d been sitting up, sipping tea.  And watching over her sister, sleeping peacefully in the twin bed across the room.  

No lingering illness then, just exhaustion and a close call for the both of them.  She stroked her fingers into Sebastian’s tousled hair.

He winced and she clucked her tongue.  His scalp was scratched where she’d clutched him last night.  

His fingers traced the reddish bite on her collarbone but when he looked up her she was still wearing open adoration on her face.  

He couldn’t stop the grin.  “I love you.”

Sebastian’s smile was dazzling but when Aeryn kissed him, his lips were soft and pliant underneath hers as he eased her down into his lap.  “I love you, too.”

“What are we doing today?”  Sebastian asked as she wrapped her legs around his waist and settled into the warmth of his arms, the linen sheet only a whisper between them.

She shrugged. “Fenris needs a day or so to recover, Bethany thinks.  I thought I’d show you the house.  Perhaps a little shopping.  Bethany and I both need ingredients and equipment if we want to restock for any fighting and I promised Varric that we’d check out the city board for a task or two.  It’s hard for him to spin tales of derring-do when we’re lazing around taverns, eating until we burst.”   Though, Sebastian could do with a solid meal or two.  He was thinner than he’d been since he’d joined her between travel and stress.  

He laid his head against her shoulder and hummed as she drew her thumbs down the upper vertebrae in his neck.  “And Cleve?”

Aeryn stroked a while longer before she answered.  “I think it’s best if we let that lie until the Bann comes home.  You’ll only be knocking your head against a wall with that woman without his support.  And…I don’t think I would...”  She paused to swallow back a spurt of anger before he straightened, waiting until she looked him in the eye.

Icy fury, well contained, of course and not at all directed at him.  Aeryn’s fingers, gentle on his jaw and the soft tone of her voice made that clear.  But the dangerous side of her was only barely hidden and a chill ran down his spine as she confessed, “I was very angry, Sebastian.  And you weren’t even there to hear.  I would like to calm down.  A lot.  Before I see her again.”  

It was a rarity, that she’d admit to any loss of control.  Perhaps he’d best heed the warning, then.

When Sebastian nodded, Aeryn continued, “We can still lend our services, should we hear of any trouble.  And I heard a few things last night that I’d like to look into further.”  She filled him in briefly about Gert and Gerry and Ifren.  

“I don’t recognize the names at all.  But if they were minor nobles, I wouldn’t have run into them unless they had own bad habits.  Baylen...I don’t know.  That name sounds more familiar.  It’s been so long.”  He shrugged, frustrated.  

“It doesn’t matter, particularly.  But I’m curious about the elves.”  She paused and asked, “And the other matter?  What do you want to do, love?”

Aeryn had walked the fine line of her reputation for quite a few years, not always successfully, but earning the respect of the Arishok and the Viscount if not the idle nobles of Kirkwall.  “I think…you have the best understanding of how to handle such a situation.”

A thread of tension let go under his ministering hands and his trust and she affirmed, “He should be here soon.”

Sebastian nodded and pressed a kiss to the upper slope of her breast with a sigh.

Hesitation stilled Aeryn’s tongue for a breath but the need to ask was impossible to resist.  What if he didn’t remember?  He’d been running a fever, perhaps a bit off his head, between exhaustion and illness and whatever had been in that restoration potion.  In a rush, before she lost her nerve, she blurted, “Do you remember…”

He _hmphed_ into her chest, growling.  “I remember you said yes and if you think you’re taking it back now, _mo chridhe_ , you’re in for something of a surprise as to how insistent I c’n be.”

His arms tightened, every bit as possessive as he’d been the night before and she laid her head on top of his, sighing happily.  “No.  I’m not taking it back.  I just…you were a bit feverish and…ah.  Well.”

“Insistent?”  He said again and smiled ruefully at her curious grunt.  “I don’t know what your sister put in that potion, but I admit it did set me up a bit brave.  I fully intended to go straight to bed last night.”

“It wasn’t actually Bethany’s.  Varric picked them up from his Guild contact.” Sebastian choked and she hastened to reassure him.  “He tested them!  I wouldn’t give you or Fenris strange potions!  It did have a dwarven ale base, though.”

“That might explain it.  Dwarven brew always did go straight to my… _ahem_.  Head.”  That pretty blush was back on his cheeks and Aeryn smirked.  “Remind me to tell you about the time I ended up in Ansburg.”

“Well, I don’t recall minding much.  So long as it wasn’t only a heady potion talking.”  

Sebastian kissed her jaw next to her ear and murmured, “I meant it, every word. I missed you.  And I don’t ever want to miss you again.”

“I imagine we’ll be apart now and again, married or not.”  Her own parents had only rarely spent a night away from the other, unless Father was scouting out a new home for them or driven to help someone.  But Malcolm had not been a prince.  And his war had been small and private.

“Not for a very long time.”  Her fingers tugged in the thick hair at the back of his skull and he tipped his head up to kiss her nose.  “Why don’t we see if I can find a barber in town, hmm?  It’s been an age since I’ve had a proper haircut.”

Aeryn had dressed and was trailing down the stairs, dallying as she waited for Sebastian to catch her up when she saw Varric breaking his fast in the dining room.

“Heya, Varric.”  She swung a leg over the chair opposite him.

“Hawke.  What do you need today?”  The dwarf asked, rather abruptly, Aeryn thought.   _Oh, dear._   

“What makes you think I need anything?  Can’t a body want to hang out with her favorite dwarf now and again?”  She filched a deck of cards from the pouch at his feet and flicked them between her fingers to deal out a quick round of _Venti une._

“Been a while, I guess.” He sorted a dozen walnut shells out of the bowl next to his elbow and divvied them out between them.

“Has it?  I’m sorry, then.”  She tossed out an ante and waited for him to answer. He simply sorted his hand and made a discard.

She turned up a second angel for herself and raised her eyebrow until he flicked his finger to ask for another card.

They played quietly for a few minutes, Varric racking up walnut hulls.  “Didn’t mean to scold, Hawke.”

“I know. It wouldn’t feel like a scold if I didn’t need something.”  She shot him her scamp’s grin and he laughed at her.

“I’m at your service and you know it.”

“Fenris was wanting to take Bethany out for an evening.  Maybe catch a…theatrical or something.  He wanted us along with him…but Varric…” Aeryn shuffled the cards again.  “I don’t know anything about how to buy a seat or…I can’t have Sebastian down in the pit, I know…but  I don’t want to be so far away from the stage that we can’t hear or the sort of show…”

He waved his hand to cut off her dithering.  “Leave it to me.  You know, it’s damned funny to think…you’ve never done much of that sort of thing.”

“I suppose.  I was invited once or twice to sit with the Viscount in his box when he was trying to convince me to seduce his son.   The one time I went, we were so far away you practically needed spyglasses to see what was on the stage.”

“Did you and Saemus ever…”  His eyebrows lifted as he popped a spoonful of warmed poached eggs and smoked fish.

“Ugh, please, Varric,” she wrinkled her nose at him.

“Hey, I’m just saying there _were_ rumors.”

“I know.  You started them.”

“Nah, blame those on Isabela.  I think she was trying to get your bed warmed up.”

“Saemus was ten years younger than I was.”  She smirked as Varric chuckled at her.  “Not that that would have stopped me if it had seemed like fun to play teacher.  But if anyone was ever completely oblivious to my varied charms, it was him.” She closed her eyes for a moment, recalling the few dances they’d shared.

“He was a good, sweet boy.  And he was flat out in love with his Ashaad.”  Aeryn sighed.  “He asked me once, if he should just…leave.”  Aeryn stacked the three cards she was holding into a precarious house.  “I told him no.  He didn’t argue with me, knew he had responsibilities.   I wish I had told him yes, put him on a boat and .” The cards tipped over as she blew across them, Knight of Dawn on top.

“It probably wouldn’t have changed anything.  Someone else would have gone after him and then he’d have been just as dead.”  He glanced around and under cover of his glass muttered,  “ No one trusted Saemus, Hawke.  Not anyone who mattered.  He’d never have made Viscount but it would always have been dangerous to have him out there.  He was too well-known and he made folks uncomfortable  ‘cause he didn’t have Dumar’s weak spine.  No matter where he went, he’d have tried to make the nobles open up and they’d have slaughtered him.”

“At least he died young and idealistic?”  She watched him, the gaze level and cool in a way he knew well.  But Varric only shrugged.  Hawke had never scared him, unless he was scared for her.

“Worse fates, baby girl.”

She blinked and the iciness was gone when she snagged his glass and sipped at his mulled wine with a grimace.  “Not the one I’d choose.”

“Give me that, I know you have better manners.”  He glared at the lowered level of the contents before he continued on,  “And here I always thought you were the blaze of glory sort.”

It would have been stupid to deny that she had been.  “Not anymore.”

“That’s good to hear.”

“Ah, Varric…you know only heroes die in their stories.”  And, she’d only ever been a hero in his.  

“Congrats, by the way.”  He reached across the table and tapped the arrow on her finger.

“How’d you know?”  Hawke dimpled up and Varric grinned at her.

“Ah, Charming was asking me a thing or two he needed some help with before we left Tellend.”

“Was he now?  He told me he had it all sorted!” she said, indignantly.

“Oh, he does…the important stuff.  This was just…details.”

Aeryn hesitated.  “Anything I should know?”

“Nah.  He’s got it.”  He flipped over a card and Aeryn caught the slight expanding breath he took before he flicked his fingers again.  “Fortune favors the brave, right?”

“Varric, you’ve got a pair of serpents, I’m pretty sure it doesn’t count as brave to hit that.”  She dealt him over a third, the serpent of avarice to fill his hand and laughed.  “Charmed.  I swear you charm the deck.”

It hadn’t been his card game he was talking about, but he swept up his winnings anyway and dumped them back in the nut bowl.  “I’ll go organize your night out, my dear lady.”

“You coming, too?”

“I hate being a fifth wheel, Hawke.  I might find a date and tag along, though.”

“Oh, do tell!”

“Don’t turn that speculation on me.  I’ve got no interest in being paired off by a happy lovebird.  But there’s bound to be a connection or two I could make.”

“Good, I’d hate to share you.” She winked at him and he rolled his eyes, patting her head as he sauntered off.

00000

The townhouse had a tall brown stone facade and a pointed grey slate roof.  The sills and the door were freshly painted a deep green and the heavy brass key turned in the lock without a creak when Aeryn tried it.

“Well, what do you think?”

It was smaller, of course, than the Hightown villa.  There was no grand hall, only a wide foyer with a staircase graciously turning up to the next floor.  The floor was laid with green and white marble tiles, but even with the dark finishes the room was light.  There were high windows up the staircase, shafts of light catching on the floating dust in the air.

“It’s very comfortable.  Is there more?”

“No of course not, just this hall.”  Sebastian grinned as she twirled into a theatrical bow for him.

She led him by the hand through the sunlit space. Furniture was haphazardly set in the square room to be used as a library and the shelves were mostly empty. We’ll have to move things around a bit.  Just off the room was another, lacking shelves but carpeted with a rug covered in stylized vining roses.  There was a desk pushed against one wall.

“Still room’s just through that door.  It’s big enough for Beth and I to share, so long as we both keep to our own sides.”

The dining room was unremarkable, except for the fact that it was so near the kitchen, in a mirror arrangement of the rooms on the other side of the house.  The broad oak table, veneered in a starburst pattern, was in need of a good scrubbing and polish.  It took up most of the floorspace, along with a few chairs, stacked haphazardly against each other.  

The walls of the foyer and the two floors Sebastian could see were panelled in golden oak.  On the second floor, the floor boards were bleached and a green stencilled pattern was still visible, despite the wear of time.  Still, despite it’s apparent age, nothing creaked beneath their feet and there was no smell of damp or must in the air.  

“Bedrooms.  And one nice room we can kit out as a temporary armory.”

He tipped his chin towards the stairs that continued to climb, smaller and finished in plain oak risers. “And up there, an attic?”

“I think it was, originally.  But I thought maybe...we could use it.”  She climbed the stairs, stepping backwards.  Still holding his hand as she pushed the door open behind her.  

There were several arches in the large room, giving it an illusion of multiple spaces.  The floorboards were wider here and less faded from the sunlight.  Someone had painted flowers and vines on the stones of the arches.  And there were several windows, two with marble sills set low enough that one could kneel and still see out.  One faced west, towards the Chantry.  Close enough to hear the call to prayer.  In one corner, there was a framed bed, almost as big as the one Aeryn had in Kirkwall. Across the room there was a long tin bathtub, edged in rolled copper with a tank next to it.  “We’ll still have to haul water, but it’s rune-marked.  I don’t know where Varric found them but he got three.”

“Andraste bless him.”  Sebastian sighed.  

“Worth every sovereign, don’t you think?  It isn’t fancy, but it’ll do for meetings, restocking and getting our feet back under us between campaigns into Starkhaven, if we find the need.”  She bit her lip, glancing at him from the side as she went over to one of the low windows and flung up the sash, letting the cool air into the dusty room. Sebastian realized she was actually worried about his opinion.

“It’s perfect.”  He stepped forward and wrapped his arm around her waist to hug her close and press a kiss to her temple.  It was.  A snug, if sparse, heaven.  Although…”You know it’s a week’s march to Starkhaven proper, from here.”

“I do.  But...we’re making forays around the city first?”  When he nodded, she flicked her hand out over the room.  “Depending on how fast or slow we can take the action, we might need the whole year’s lease.”  Outside, the sound of a violin wafted into them in a sweet melody.

Hmm.  A year wasn’t a commitment.  He’d wanted to take her to his grandfather’s villa, where he’d spent a summer as a boy.  Just a day and a half from Starkhaven.  If they needed a retreat…

“What are you thinking?”

She was chewing on her lip again.  He stilled the nervous twitch with a gentle thumb.  “That I would like to build a home with you, someday, _leannan_.”

She kissed the tip of his thumb and said slowly, “This is just a camp.  A very nice one, with a bathtub and a cook.  There’s time for…more, later.”

“Yes, there is.”  

Sebastian’s smile was soft, but it reached his eyes, crinkling the thin skin.  She brushed her hand across his cheek and tiptoed up to kiss him.  

He clasped her hand to his heart and swung her around, swaying along to the call of the music.  She leaned into him and let him steer them around the room as the violin player bared down into their melody and took it to a height.  

A few minutes later saw them back on the street and crossing the bridge to the open-air market.  Sebastian carried the basket she bought at the first vendor as Aeryn filled it with a length of sausage links and a long loaf of yeasty bread with a firm crust.  She was negotiating for a bottle of cider when he spotted the barber pole across the alley way.    

He sat in the chair that the barber whisked off and grinned at Aeryn.  “Well, tell the woman what you want.”

“It’s your hair.”

“And you’re the one telling me I need a trim.”

She rolled her eyes and told her, “Just neaten him up and keep it off his neck.”

“Of course.”  The barber chattered on about how Sebastian was so lucky to still have such nice thick hair, while the man she’d seen this morning had been as bald as an egg and Aeryn let herself watch the way the light shifted on his warm skin as he moved his head to her direction and the way the rich brown curls gleamed against the silver shears before they fell to the stone paving.  It was only the scrape of the metal comb against the glass that drew her attention, the teeth… _sharp_ teeth _new metal_ of the comb dripping with water, tinted a pale green with some….Aeryn snapped her eyes to the face of the barber, gone suddenly intent.  

Aeryn’s body was moving before her head caught up.

Sebastian had tucked his chin as the woman had requested and only heard a thudding impact, the shattering of glass covering a scream as Aeryn flung herself into the woman’s slight figure, the lightning flash of ivory dragonbone dragging his eyes to the pair.

Horrid snaps, more screams.  Aeryn had broken three of the fingers on the barber’s cutting hand and one of Aeryn’s wicked narrow blades was biting into the elf’s freckled throat. As the metal comb clattered to the floor, she snarled.  “Who do you work for?  Who hired you?”

Wide brown eyes pleaded with him, “I don’t… Messere help me she’s mad…”

Two more snaps and the elf’s shrieks were drawing attention now, he saw a guard running towards them from far down the street.  “I will cut them _off_.  Who are you working for?”

“Aeryn…”

“Comb’s sharpened and poisoned.”

He looked down at the offending comb.  It had landed near a large black and red velvet ant, the poor creature curled in on itself and twitching; ice slid down his spine.  When he looked back up the assassin had given up her pretense.  “Antivan Crows send their regards.”

Aeryn was not impressed. “Liar.”  Another shivering piercing scream and there was blood dripping down her captive’s dress and a finger lying on the floor, one of her tiny curved blades hidden in the grip of her glove.  “Who sent you?”

“Aeryn, you can’t torture her!”

For the first time she looked at him instead of her prey.  “We need to know what she knows.”

He drew himself up before her gaze.  “Not like this.” The elf stopped her struggles against her captor and looked at him her mouth dropped open in shocked laughter.

“Sebastian…”  A fly buzzed between them, drawn to the ruined sweetness of spilled cider and spiced sausage from the bag Aeryn had dropped.

He shook his head.  “Can you be sure that she isn’t under a bloodmage’s control?”

“You know I can’t.”

“Then...no, Aeryn. You can’t torture her.”  He said it again as the fly lit by the ant and the monotone whirr from its wings fell silent.

The assassin snickered.  “Oh, Maker’s saggy tits.  I thought it was all smoke and screen but you really _are_ a Chantry boy.”

The guard finally made it to them shouting, “What’s all this?!”

“She attacked my fiancé.  There’s poison on the comb.”

The elf tried another attempt to beg her freedom, ”Oh serah, they’re insane.”  Sobbing nearly incoherently and clutching her mauled hand.  From the gathered crowd, though another elf gasped, “That’s not Tella!  Who are you?”

“Don’t know what you’re talking about.”  

“ _Andraste_...what did you…”  the guard was gaping at the bloody ruin of the assassin’s hand, revealed as he attempted to bind them in the length of chain and leather cuffs he’d pulled from his pocket.  

Aeryn had drawn herself square, slipping her blade back into the unobtrusive scabbard she’d strapped to her back out of habit earlier in the day.  “I defended my fiancé, serah.  I was trying to keep her from escaping.”

The guard swallowed, hard, but he nodded before he pointed the comb out to Sebastian.  “Can you wrap that up?  My captain will need to see it.”   She shook her head at him and knelt down to take care of the improvised weapon, herself, so he busied himself with gathering up the remains of their abandoned snack.  

A screech pierced the murmuring crowd and several more people burst into the open shop front.  Tella’s merchant friend had found a corpse, the skin around her mouth and eyes turning black beneath a tarp.  The guard grimaced and flicked the tarp back over the body.  Another female elf came and drew her sobbing companion away.  

Aeryn looked at the body.  “Be sodding careful with that comb, serah.  It’s Antivan foulrot…one drop of that stuff will rot you from the fingers in.”

“You know poison.”  He checked his pouch to make sure the comb had stayed tightly wrapped.

“I do.  I was a scout for the King of Ferelden before the Blight.  More recently a bodyguard for King Alistair and his Queen.”

It wasn’t exactly a lie.  Alistair would back her up given the need.

“Why’nt you come along and speak with the Captain, messeres?”

“Of course.”  Aeryn laid her hand on Sebastian’s arm and they decorously followed the guard and his bound prisoner.  Under the cover of a fold on his sleeve, she was squeezing tightly and Sebastian casually draped his other hand over her fingers to stroke some warmth back into her chilled grip.

The Guard was housed about a block from the Keep and in short order Aeryn and Sebastian found themselves seated in the Captain’s office.  It was a plain stone room, decorated with a littered desk, cluttered notice boards and a sword in a glass case.

The Captain himself, introduced as Gellas,  was a stocky, short fellow, only a head or so taller than Aeryn.  But his armor was well cared for, his blade was used and he had a scarred face that told his worth.

“A scout for the King, eh?”

“Such was my duty, Captain Gellas.”

 _“Hmph._  And why are there Crows after this man?”

“Not Crows.  I’ve met their master, he’d not accept a contract for one of mine.”

“Honor among thieves?”

Aeryn gave him a thin smile.  “Owes me a debt.  I was offered a contract on him once and had him at a disadvantage.”

“And didn’t take it?”

“Well, he’s a hero of the Blight, serah.  And I was Ferelden.”

“Was?”

“It was before I returned to attend my cousin, King Alistair.  Who is also well acquainted with the Master of Crows.”

“So it’s said.”  The man’s twisted mouth turned slightly prissy.   As if an assassin might be a poor acquaintance for a royal.  Aeryn pressed back the urge to grin, maintaining her serious mien as Sebastian spoke.

“One of the reasons we’re in Priden is to follow up on a series of assassinations.  Queen Dierdre was attacked by a woman under a bloodmage’s control.  According to Master Arraini, it wasn’t an isolated incident.  We’re looking for the apostates.”  Sebastian explained.

“We’ve got bloodmages here?”  His color drained.

“We hope not.  It’s possible that by fouling their attempt on the Queen, we’ve attracted their attention though.”

“Which is why you didn’t just kill the elf?”

“It’s possible she’s innocent or at least…not accountable.  We just ask that if she begins to act….oddly, that you send for us.  We’d like to question her again.”

“Not accountable.  Well…the victim we’ve got was only an elf herself.  Guess its alright if we hold on to her for a while.  She’ll hang tomorrow, though.  That give you enough time?”

“Yes.  I think so.”

Captain Gellas read off the report the guard had laid on his desk.  “Sebastian Vael.  One of those Vaels?”  Captain Gellas jerked his head to the west.

“I’m a cousin of the Prince of Starkhaven.”  Sebastian said easily.

“That so?  Well, you’d do us all a favor if you’d mention to your cousin that a tight border is a better show.  Getting a little tired of cleaning up along the north road.”

“Bandits?”

“Bandits, highway robbers, murderers, roaming hordes of wild elves.  It’s been sodding chaos this winter.  We’ve kept it out of town for the most part…but it’s not going to last.”

Aeryn raised her eyebrow and Sebastian pulled out the medallion the Chantry mother had given him.  “I was hoping to find aid in that department.  The Revered Mother of Tellend is requesting aid from Bann Cleve.  Her official messenger was killed on the way here and we were sent in her place.  I have the papers in safe keeping if you need them.  But his daughter has refused to hear us, as yet.”

“My lady Zenna gets uppity when her _père_ ’s away.  She usually settles down pretty quick, though.”  He fixed deep brown eyes on Aeryn.  “I know your name, too, I think.”

“It’s possible.”

Gellas flicked through some old notices pinned to his board and plucked off a sheet with a very poor likeness of Aeryn.  “The Seekers are looking for you, messere.”

Sebastian felt the bottom drop out of his stomach and he curled his fingers protectively over Aeryn's again, even as she answered nonchalantly.

“That, too, is possible.”

“All the notice says is to let the Chantry know if you’re seen.  That they’ll handle it.  You are a mage? Dangerous?”

Sebastian forced himself to remain still, mirroring Aeryn’s ease.  

“No, Captain.  I’m not.  But you’re welcome to bring me to the Templars to find out.”

He glanced at the medallion Sebastian wore.  “Seems like the Chantry already knows you’re around.  You are a merc, then?  Hiring out?”

“No.  As Sebastian said, we’re investigating a matter for King Alistair.”

“Your cousin.”

“It’s a distant relation.”  She said demurely.  “He was kind to offer me some work in my field.”

Sebastian thought it might be better to drop in a more local name.  “Bann Cleve gave his permission.  He knew we were coming.  He had some interest in the matter, as well.  We would be able to look into some of your troubles until the Bann returns.  If you’re stretched a bit.”

“Just you two?”

“My partner and my sister are with us and another friend.  We do have some experience in…dealing with troubles. And…we were considering making Priden our home.  I’ve rented a small house just a street down from here.  As Lady Zenna was less welcoming than we’d been led to believe.”

Aeryn saw a small knot of tension clear in the man’s face.  He’d known that.  Admitting it had been a good idea.

Gellas looked back at the parchment in his hand for another long moment, before he crumpled it.  “Priden is a quiet place, messeres.  Any trouble should be kept out of the walls.”  He cleared his throat.  “I don’t like mercenaries.  I keep them out when I can.”

“That’s understandable.  We aren’t for hire and the last thing we want is to trouble your city, Captain.”

“That’s well and good.  Trouble’s here, though.  Isn’t it?”

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _bain ribhinn_ is Starkish for beautiful, white snake.


	36. Chapter 36

They walked back from the Captain’s office in silence. The day had turned almost warm as the sun had climbed in the sky.

A perfect day for a picnic.

But there were no such gentle pursuits in store for them.  Aeryn had wrapped herself in silence almost the instant they stepped out of the shadow of the tall stone building.  

Outwardly, she wore a slight smile as if they were only on the stroll they had begun that morning, simply enjoying one another’s company.  But Sebastian could feel the stillness she cultivated hanging like a miasma around them.  She’d been wearing the scarf Bethany had given her wrapped loosely around her neck and shoulders, but before they’d left the Captain’s office, she’d pulled it up around her cropped hair.  The blue and red paisley and the finely woven wool hid the sharp angles of her face and her eyes; more lady-like than the deep hood she’d worn often in Kirkwall, but serving a similar purpose.  

He stroked his fingers over hers, tucked into the crook of his elbow.  She’d tugged a pair of dark suede gloves on that morning but Sebastian could feel alert nervous energy radiating through them and stiffness in the fine leather where the assassin’s blood had dried.  

Every inch of her was alert; he could feel it, the strength of her as they walked.  Lithe, dark, violent urgency snarling under the thin, pale veil of her skin.  

She was hunting, again.

The back of Sebastian’s neck tingled, still feeling the cold hard edge of the assassin’s scissors.  It hadn’t occurred to him that he was in any danger from such an innocuous task.  How many hundreds of times had he simply sat and let a stranger come at him with blade and razor?  

Only Aeryn’s reflexes and her broad streak of distrust had saved him, this time.  He refrained from tugging her closer; the sudden shudder he had to suppress, cold despite the sun.  

She felt it anyway.  Sebastian saw her eyes flick towards him and he lifted the corners of his mouth.  He couldn’t manage to keep the smile up but he could rely on his own veneer of noble disdain to maintain their illusion of normalcy.  The way she picked up their pace, shifting from stroll to a brisk, businesslike stride told him he hadn't fooled her.

As bells rang out the afternoon call to Chant, they kept to the main path once they crossed the bridge, ignoring the buzz and scatter of children just released from lessons.   The market was quiet.  Besides them, only a handful of adults missing an ingredient for dinner or out to take advantage of the warm sun even in the cool air roamed the narrow cobbled walks between the stalls.  One old woman dressed in dark, heavy clothes was leaning against the stacked redstone wall that edged the path with her face turned up to the light. Aeryn pressed his arm with her fingertips as they approached the beggar, steering Sebastian away from his usual inclination to drop silver in the small cup sitting on the capstone beside a walking stick.  

Another flicker of her lashes, dark against her cheek, asked him.  Not today.

He tightened his fingers on her hand again and followed Aeryn’s direction to the far side of the walkway, pointing out a carriage and a pair of high-stepping grey horses in order to spare the beggar’s sensibilities.  Or his own.  Probably his own.  Not his safety.  He could not turn away from need for his safety, ever, and consider himself his own man.  

But for Aeryn’s?  For her peace of mind and her safety from whatever hunted her and him, now?  That was an easy priority.  

Aeryn’s raised eyebrow and hum of interest covered the way she cut her eyes behind them.  The woman hadn’t stirred as they passed.  Possibly asleep.  Not dead, she decided, watching a hitching breath lift the thin ribcage.   Sebastian’s fine jawline had gone a touch rigid.  She’d make it up to them both another day, once Aeryn had asked one of her tagalongs for the beggar’s history.  Easy to hide strength in rags but most folks liked habit.  If she’d been there before, if she was a regular..then the kids would know.  

They crossed the street and entered the relative privacy of the circle that their inn sat in.  An hour after the lunch crowd had dispersed, only a handful of patrons and staff were out in the courtyards.  Even so, Aeryn weighed and measured each individual until the heavy oak door opened to receive them.  Sebastian shut it solidly behind them, releasing a breath he hadn't realised he was holding.

Varric was sitting in the shadowed front room, relief clear on his broad handsome face as he stood when the silver bell over the door announced them.  He said nothing, but somehow he’d known.  Bianca was strapped in ready across his shoulders and he flicked his hand back to replace the safety catch.

“So, how’d the house look, Sebastian?” His eyes ticked over to the desk clerk flicking through his ledger, very clearly curious about something.

Fortunately, Sebastian caught the warning and smiled convincingly back at Varric.  “It’s a fine place.  I think we’ll be very comfortable there.”

“Don’t see why not.  Hawke, I found a couple of cooks and a housemaid for you to meet, later.”

“Sounds good. Send word with Tibby, they can meet us there this afternoon.  I’d like to get moved in tomorrow.  We don’t particularly need them to do it, but it’d be nice to have help.”

“So you’ll be leaving us tomorrow, messeres?”

Aeryn shot the old man a mild look, “Just as we arranged, serah.” As they mounted the stairs, the Starkish brother and sister pressed in from the dining room.  

“Serah, have you seen our servant?  He didn’t return from the stables this morning.”

“The elf? No, Messere Jacobi, I can’t say that I have...” His obsequious voice followed them up the stairs.

Varric waited until they were safely behind their door and had checked the floor for snooping maids.  Aeryn glanced at Fenris’ door, still closed as she pushed the scarf from her hair and ruffled her bangs.

“What happened?  I thought you two were just going for a stroll?”

“We were.  What’d you hear?”

“Kayla tore in here a couple of hours ago, telling me you’d been arrested.  I managed to keep her from shouting it all over the inn and sent her home. Didn’t figure you wanted them hanging out around the jail, but I was about to come looking.”

“Not arrested.  Sebastian was attacked and I…”  Aeryn shrugged.  “They wanted to question us.  But we’re free.  For the moment.”

“Right.” Varric’s chuckle was bemused, “Leave it to you to find an assassin tucked in a marketplace.  The bloodmages?”

Aeryn shook her head.  “I don’t think so.  She had all the hallmarks of a merc.  Killed a barber just to get in and no one recognized her.  If it was the mages, they’d have taken the barber herself, I’d think.  She just saw an opportunity.  It was a good one.”  

“Damn. Close?”  Varric glanced Sebastian over and Sebastian refrained from turning to display himself.  It wasn’t Varric’s fault he’d been lured into complacency.

“Very.” Close enough that Aeryn could still see the scratches of newly sharpened metal on the comb, every time she closed her eyes.  

“She claimed to be a Crow.”  Sebastian added.

The two of them looked up at him and Varric shook his head in bemusement.  “Well...I guess it’s possible Zevran doesn’t have all his birds in a row.”

“That’d be ducks not crows.  No, it’s possible, but I don’t think that’s likely either.  I think we’re looking at another player.”

“Your illustrious fat-fingered cousin?”  

Sebastian nodded, hesitantly.  “Perhaps.  Or someone who supports him.  There is another complication.”

“Isn’t there always?” Varric chuckled but it lacked it’s normal rich tone.    

Aeryn raised her chin. “Give me a minute to clean up, Bethany and Fenris need to hear, too.”

Sebastian had twined his fingers with hers again and she gave his hand a squeeze.  His other hand curved around her waist.

Hawke and her disciple were never shy about their public displays of affection anymore, but clinging touches combined with the way Vael's gaze hadn’t left Hawke for a moment didn’t escape Varric’s observation.  “Alright, Hawke.  I’ll go flag down your messenger and get that help checked out.  I think...think I’ll double check their references.”

“What would I ever do without you, Varric?”

“Don’t worry, Hawke, you won’t have to find out anytime soon.”

Sebastian waited until Varric had closed the door behind him and pulled Aeryn into a tight hug.  She didn’t resist, burying her nose in the warm wool doublet he’d worn out that morning.  Thin and light, well-made and fashionable, so as not to draw eyes among Priden’s unmartial populace.  

Stupid.  She’d not let him go out without his armor again.  Nor would she. The neat leather jerkin she’d worn over her skirted trousers had barely turned the small blade the assassin had tried to slip between her ribs, thanks to the thin strips of silverite she’d had the seamstress work into the lining.  

He murmured into her hair.  “Thank you.”

Aeryn tightened her arms, locking him against her.  “Anytime.  Preferably not soon, though.”

“Hmm.”  Her body was tense as an elegant trap against him, a spring coiled so tightly that it was guaranteed to warp and ensnare any unwary passerby.  "I won't let them…” Her head was tucked against his chest, and he curled his fingers into the short fine hair at the back of her head, as if he could hide her from the preying reach.

“No.”  Aeryn wanted to tell Sebastian she knew he wouldn't, feeling all his intent in the strength of his hands and the solid metronome of his heart..  But really...they had no power, now.  He laid a claim to an old name and a bow and she had what she'd always had, skill and a willingness to do murder.  If the Seekers came, if they lost a fight, found themselves cornered, those were nothing against the strong arm of the Chantry. so fly foolish Hawke

Can't.  Not without him.  Bethany, on the other hand...

'I'm going to ask Fenris to take Beth,” she told him.  “Probably back to Ferelden. I know it'll be harder going without them, but...you and Varric.  They won't want you two and...there's only so much they can do to..".

She could feel herself tightening up and her voice choking, the road ahead tunnelling out and Sebastian's warm, reassuring presence fading as old panic, old as her earliest memories reached for her.   No.  They’ve never wanted me before.   It wasn't her own fear she was remembering. Mother's.  And Father's.  Embarrassing really, that it could still find her after so many years past and so many worse endings faced.

Sebastian watched her, could almost see as she slipped away from him and back into the past.  Her face buried against his chest and he shifted his hand, reflexively, cupping the back of her skull, stroking the delicate skin behind her ear.  

He loaned her his presence and waited until she’d relaxed, squared her shoulders and come back to him and the present before he continued.  “You have to ask her.  You can't just send her away like an inconvenient child nor is she a soldier to follow your orders.”

“But…”  Aeryn bit off her objection.  He was probably right. She pulled away to strip off her gloves and unwind the scarf from her neck.  

Sebastian took the cloth from her. and folded it neatly.“Trust me.  I've a bit of knowledge as to what its like to be shuffled here and there by those who think they know best, hmm?”

She agreed with a sigh, “Yes, I suppose you do. But…you’ve said yourself, that a lot of good came out of it.”

“When I was nineteen.  And blind and stupid as to what I was doing to myself. Aeryn…”

She held up a placating hand.  “Alright, fine.  I’ll ask.”

“And you’ll listen when she says no?”  He glanced at her from the corner of his eye as he tucked her scarf into her pack.

“I don’t know.”  She popped her neck.  “I just want her safe.”  Both of you, safe.  

“I know that.  I do.  But you have to listen, leannan.”

“I’m still oldest, I shouldn’t have to.”  She groused; good naturedly, Sebastian thought, but her eyes were distant, still.

He tapped the end of her nose only to have her raise an elegant eyebrow at him.  “Bethany is…”

“A grown woman.  And well able to know her own mind.”  Aeryn repeated as if she’d tried to memorize it by rote.  “Fine. Let’s go talk to them.”

Bethany and Fenris had been having a reading lesson  Taking advantage of his bedridden state, Bethany had set Fenris on a task of copying out a few passages from a translation of The History of Thedas, a copy of which they'd found tucked in the chest in the room they'd occupied.   It had been stuffed full of notes and the side margins had scribbles in three languages on many of the worn pages, but it was readable.  Bethany looked up from the small pile she’d made of the gathered notes, her pleasant expression fading as she read their worry, took in Sebastian’s half-trimmed hair.    
  


Aeryn perched on the end of Fenris’ bed, ruffling the edges of the book’s pages with a restless thumb and smiled when his toes, tucked under a loose roll of blanket, touched her knee.  “We’ve a...problem, I’m afraid.”

“A complication, Varric said.”  Nodding to the dwarf who’d settled into the armchair by the fire.   

“One or two.  Someone tried to kill Sebastian this morning.  An assassin.  With poison and willing to get very close.”  

“They are dead.”  Fenris said it with confidence, only to breathe in sharply when Aeryn shook her head.

“No, she’s not.  Sebastian asked me to wait and a guard showed up before...”

“That was dangerous, Sebastian.”

“Perhaps.” Sebastian accepted Fenris’ criticism. “Guard Captain Gellas was a fine host, the assassin is under surveillance.  And he shared some information with us that is troubling.”  To say the least.  He wasn’t sure which was bothering her more.  She’d strangled back the earlier fear that had surfaced so briefly to talk to the rest of their companions, now.  

Utterly opaque, Aeryn could have been planning a day’s outing when she casually continued.  “According to the Guard Captain, not only is there some interest in my whereabouts, the interest is coming from the Seekers.”

“The Seekers?” Fenris thought out loud.  “That Sister Nightingale...Leliana, we met for the Grand Cleric worked for the Seekers, did she not?”  

“Yeah.”  Aeryn was watching her sister pleat a fold in her dress with slender tanned fingers.  “She was only there to warn us about the interest in Kirkwall.  These are apparently after me.”

Bethany looked up sharply, “Why?  You’re no mage.”

“No.  But I protected one who blew up a Chantry in the name of mage freedom, didn’t I?”  Aeryn said, a wan smile on her lips.  “There’s no reason for them to believe I wasn’t in on it with Anders.  I imagine, if they looked, they’d find plenty of Kirkwall’s nobles willing to say I was.  I had a good dozen of Anders’ tracts in the library that I’d not gotten around to handing back to him.  One in my nightstand.  I’d a stash of staves and robes in a closet that I’d meant to sell that never got traded out. There’s proof enough that I might be arming a rebellion, at the least inciting runaways,” she finished with a hollow chuckle.

Sebastian had begun pacing again, but her words jerked him to a halt.  “You think they've ransacked the estate?”

Sebastian’s question ruffled the smooth calm she’d displayed, like a stone in water.   “That’s..that’s what they do to the homes of mages and sympathizers.  Like breaking up a badger sett. The estate was mostly stone, though.  It might still be standing at least.  I’m sorry, for Cousin Charade’s sake.  The last documents left it in her name.”   She’d tilted her head quizzically at him, at the anger that must have flickered across his face and tried to explain.  “Father had us watch once or twice, so we’d...we were safely distant.”

“He made you watch?” Sebastian wanted to be ill.   From the corner of his eye he could see a faint trace of shock on Varric's face, the way Bethany's eyes had widened.  Had she been too young to remember any of the thorns her father had left to fester under her sister's skin?  

“I...don’t recall him ever…” Bethany said hesitantly.

“Well, you were still fairly young that last time.  Four or so, I think.  Carver remembered, but...” Sebastian had bristled, fury gathering in the tight clench of his mouth and Aeryn decided not to mention how Father had reinforced the lesson.  The family that had lived south of Redcliffe.  The empty shell of a farmhouse a few miles from their place.  Why they had to protect Bethany’s secret.  Why it was important.  She glanced down at the fuzzy weft of the blanket tented over Fenris’ feet.

Bethany glanced between them before she tried to dispel the sudden tension and bring them back to task.  "But..I was in the Gallows.  Surely I’d have been one of your runaways?”

“How many Templars survived?  There was at least one who’d tell them you and I were at odds for most of our time in Kirkwall.”  

Bethany answered the unasked question, “Cullen wouldn’t.  Unless...he thought it might protect us to show that we weren't together.”

“Alright.  But...Keran?  A few others who might not have realized we’d reconciled. Or would assume you were helping  from inside.”  

“The underground.  Damn, Hawke.  I should have let up on those stories.  There at the end, when…”

Varric was uncharacteristically solemn and Aeryn shook her head at him, her lips tipped up easily. “I don’t recall ever telling you to stop, Varric.  We...the stories helped get a lot of people free.  Helped the mages trust us.”  

“If Cullen is Knight Commander and Aveline’s still Captain, it is unlikely they’ve been giving out information to the Seekers freely.”  Too many variables; wind and time and distance and interference. Sebastian grimaced and Varric was clearly thinking along the same lines.

“We need a source from Kirkwall...it’d help to know what’s being said.  I’ll look into it, again.  See if i can’t turn up more recent gossip.”

“You might try and see if Elegant’s still in the city.  Far as I know, she still likes me and she always knew what was up,” Aeryn shrugged.  “Well, we don’t mean to keep a low profile at any rate.  The Captain here knows my name, knows who I am, and has an order from the Chantry to tell them where I am.   He’s accepted that Sebastian’s working for the Chantry and that I’m working for Alistair right now and apparently that absolves him from doing anything rash.   We don’t know if he really does or how long it’ll last.  We don’t know that Cleve will agree to work with us once he knows about the Seekers.  Or Lord Robard or anyone else for that matter.”  

Aeryn had turned blank all of a sudden as she listed the new problems they might be facing, and Sebastian laid his hand on her shoulder, lightly.  “Except Alistair, who’s already asked our aid for any trouble from the Chantry that shows up in Ferelden.”

“Hmm.”  Giving herself a small shake, Aeryn turned to her sister to take the opening.  “Bethany...I would like you to go back.”

“Back?  To Ferelden?”

Aeryn nodded.  

“Without you?”

Slower, Aeryn nodded again.

“No!”  Her younger sister drew herself up to full height.  “You can’t do that!  This is not eight years ago! I’m not a child and you are definitely not my mother.”

“Which is why I’m asking.”  Sebastian shook his head at Aeryn’s innocent tone.

Bethany scowled at Aeryn, sitting with her hands out and looking completely reasonable.  “Oh, are you?  Well, then my answer is I won’t go.  You’ve got nothing to hold over me this time.”

Well, that’s certainly not true.  Aeryn caught Fenris’ eye and raised her eyebrow.  He tilted his head and flicked a finger across the sheet.  Aeryn pressed her knee against his foot. He nodded but before he could speak, Bethany shouted.

“Stop that!”  Bethany looked up, startled, at Sebastian’s muffled echo of her protest from behind his hand.

“They’re right.”  Varric raised his hand to stop Aeryn from objecting.  “Save it for fights and cheating at cards.  If we’re in this together, we need to know what you’re thinking.”  
  


Fenris explained, “She was asking if I would go as well.”  And if he agreed with her, but Fenris had been keeping her secrets a long time.  He did agree.  What battle they had seen so far had not set well with Bethany, somehow.  Her sleep had been troubled.  

“And what was your answer?”

He looked up at Bethany and said simply, “That I would, but only to see you to safety at Alistair’s court.”

Bethany made a small noise of frustration.  “I’m not going.  So the two of you can just…”  With another grunt she flung her hands up and walked out of the door, brushing Varric’s shoulder and shooting Sebastian a half smile for their support as she left.

“Well, asking went so well.”

“It is...frustrating when you do that in normal conversation, leannan.”  

She grumbled, her shoulders twitching in.  “Fine.  We’ll try not to, not that it ever seemed to bother anyone right up to this moment.”  

“Who was going to object?  Merrill thought it fascinating, Isabela could carry in on the conversation, and Anders wasn’t about to give anyone more ammunition over his crush on you.”

“And you?”  

Sebastian gritted his teeth before he admitted, “Jealousy is a sin.  But it is one I’ve met and dealt with before.”  

“You are not!”

“Ohh, but I am.”  Faint color on his cheekbones emphasized his muttered assurance.  Fenris swallowed a cough as Varric fiddled with the frogging of his coat.  

“Oh.”  She blinked. “Well.”

Fenris cleared his throat again and after he took a sip of the tea Sebastian had offered him added,   “Someone should go after Bethany.”

“Someone being me?”

“Perhaps.”  The foot nudged against her was less subtle.

“Hmm.”

But Bethany was back at the door.  “No one needs to come after me.  I’m staying.  But you all… You have to listen.  I can’t keep healing you up from catastrophic injuries.  I’’m not a healer.  It’s...very draining and it’s starting to affect me.  You’re all going to have to start making a more conscious effort.”  She pointed at Aeryn, but included them all in a glower that reminded Sebastian of his tutors at the Chantry.  “No more foolish chances.  Take precautions.  Use the buffers I know you all know.  I can make very potent potions ahead of time, that’s a skill not a talent.  Between us, we can manage.   I think it will be fine, but...you have to help me.  I can fight.  But I can’t...you have to give me a break from the heavy healing.”

Aeryn snapped, shaking Sebastian’s hand from her shoulder.  “This is a foolish chance.  You realize that right?  Staying with me-with the Seekers after us- means you are like as not to end up in another Circle and probably Tranquil.  Or dead.”    

Bethany met her sister’s eyes, gone a bit cold, with an equally steady glare.  “Then I’ll live free as I can.  And not run away and let you do it for me, again. And as for you,”  Bethany pointed an accusing finger at Fenris who leaned back against his pillows, somewhat abashed.  “You can stop taking her side against me, right now.  Are we clear?”

He nodded, dark brows lifting and almost nervously, chuckled,  “We...are.”  “As you wish, Bethany.  Forgive me.”

“Hmph.  Drink your tea.”

“Nonetheless, I suppose Varric’s right.  I’ve let you all pointing to me as the leader of this merry band go to my head.  I’ll keep my orders to the battlefield, from now on.”  That distant look closed her features again but when Sebastian moved to touch her, Aeryn’s shoulder twitched subtly away from his fingers, her knee moved just out of Fenris’ reach.  She managed to make herself smaller, somehow. He clenched his hand, resisting the urge to pull her attention to him.  

Relenting, Bethany tried again to appeal to her sister’s sense, “Aeryn, I understand why.  But, surely you see I can’t?”

“No, I don’t see it at all, actually.”  Bethany opened her mouth to argue but Aeryn continued.  “But that’s what you want and we can certainly use your help, can we not?”  She looked up at Sebastian though she didn’t catch his eyes.

He nodded, cautiously, “Yes, if I’m allowed to have my opinion.”

A frown flickered across her face but Aeryn answered cooly.  “So, we’ll be more careful and you...will live as you wish.  You proved to me years ago that I’ve no way to keep you if you won’t be kept.”   She slid off the cot.  “Varric, you said we could meet that cook?”

“Yeah, should be someone here pretty soon with a note back from Steph.”  

“Fine.  I need to clean my knives, if you’ll excuse me.” Aeryn padded out of the room in stocking feet, stripping off the outer layer of skirted coat to her tunic as she went.  

“She’s just worried about you, Sunshine.”  Varric told her, as Bethany leaned against the wall, looking as if she’d fought a battle.

Bethany nodded reluctantly breathing deeply, “I know, Varric.  But…”

“You can’t let her walk over you.”

“No, I can’t.  If I thought I was a danger to you all, you know I’d go, right?”

“Hawke has never liked being a target.  She’ll be out of temper until she works through it.”  Fenris reminded them, the grave tone at odds with the half-smile he gave Bethany.  

Sebastian nodded ruefully, “Especially since the prison.  Varric, I hate to ask you, but...”

“Yeah, I need to find some ears back home.  Good thing I’m such a handsome guy, they’d get tired of me downtown, otherwise.”  He buttoned up a few of the carved buttons on his coat and followed Hawke out of the door.

Sebastian lingered, lost in thought, as Bethany tidied the blankets at Fenris’ feet and then sat down to the desk to finish the list she’d been composing of things she needed to kit out a still room.  

Fenris took his book back up, glancing occasionally at Sebastian’s still figure.  After a few minutes, he asked, “Sebastian, would you like me to…”

Startled out of his reverie, Sebastian blinked for a moment and then sighed, “No.  I wanted to give her a moment to get settled.  Forgive me for the intrusion.  I’ll take myself out of your hair.”  He glanced at Bethany, who had looked up at him.  “She’ll see your side of it.  Eventually.” His unspoken I hope settled on the air between them.

“Probably not, Sebastian.  She’s always been free to choose her path with little consequence.  It’ll be hard to make her see why I won’t stay safe.”

“Free to choose her path?  Is that what you call it?”  

Bethany gritted her teeth.  “It’s not my fault she chose otherwise as often as she did.”

“No.  I suppose we both know who bears that fault.”  Sebastian bowed abruptly and, leaving, closed the door behind him.

Fenris watched his friend leave and turning, saw Bethany had bowed her head; dark hair waving loose, obscuring her face.   

She stood like that for a moment and then glanced up at him.  “Sometimes, for all that he’s good, for all that he’s offered to be my brother...I’m not sure if he likes me very much.”

“Sebastian has been an admirer of yours for some time, Bethany.  It isn’t you he’s angry with.”

“No?”

Fenris scowled, considering whether or not to say his piece then shook his head and flung his hand out.  “He brought us...her...here.  He’s expecting her to fight a war that will put him on the front line.  And he knows her now in a way he couldn’t have when they first devised this plan.  He’s endangering her by reclaiming that name of his and putting a target on his back.  We were safe and well suited in Ferelden, but they had to come back to the Free Marches, where she’s wanted with little protection to fall behind to return to a home that may have nothing for him.  He’s comparing himself to your parents.”

“Maker, Fenris.”  Bethany sat beside him careful not to jostle the cot and slid her hand next to his.  He crooked his smallest finger over hers and felt his lips echo her tiny smile.  

“It's only that..I'd have sworn that the only person who ever loved Aeryn as much as Sebastian  was our father.  He adored the ground she walked on.  No one ever doubted she was his favorite."   She shook her head.   "It's hard to reconcile...what he must have done to make her...You never knew him but, you knew our mother.  Did you think...was she so hard on Aeryn after I...left?”

“She was.”  She waited while he weighed his words and finally shook his head. “I am not the best person to ask.  Your mother was always very kind to me.”  

“And Sebastian is generally very kind to me.  But, it’s disconcerting to think...how much power he could have over my future, if this goes the way they hope.  And if I put Aeryn in danger, if something happens to her protecting me...who will he blame?”

Fenris could not think of a comforting answer, but when she curled her hand into his, he closed his long, warm fingers over hers before he took up his book and began, carefully, to read the description of the construction of the College of Magi in Nevarre.  Bethany watched him for a moment before she leaned back against the wooden headboard, curling her knees up to listen.  

Seated in the corner of the room across from the low bedframe, Aeryn had her small knives fanned out in front of her, points out and hilts towards her.  Barefoot, bare armed she sat tailor-fashioned in their midst.  Her spare whetstone placed at a precise angle to her left and proceeding from left to right in the spread of blades, she was engrossed in the smooth sound of steel against the dark oiled stone in her hand.

Aeryn treated her sharpening like a ritual, the tools of her trade as sacred to her as candles and robes in the sacristy before Chant began.   Her eyes were closed, as if she sharpened the blade to a note she could only hear.  

Sebastian accepted the silence that met him.  She knew he was here.  Instead of interrupting her, he knelt by the window and gave thanks for his life, more formally than he’d managed in days.  

Enough time passed that the shadows in the room shifted.  Aeryn noticed after awhile that Sebastian's murmured prayers were running at the same rhythm as her sharpening.  Or had she matched his pace?  Hard to tell.  

"Do you want to go to the Chantry?" she asked, voice rusty, at the end of the verse.

It took him a moment to shift from the Chant’s rhythms to answer her.  “No.  I'll go in the morning and ask a bit of covered flame to light candles for a private altar.”

Aeryn nodded, watching her own hands work before offering, “That was always one of my favorite stories.”

“Which?”  He watched her resheathe the smallest blade the tiny curved piece of steel she'd removed two of the elf's fingers with.  It was clean now and gleaming.  Only her black stilleto remained in front of her, the rest of the blades tucked away.

“The bits of burnt tinder that Andraste’s followers stole from the fire, that kept bursting back into flame every night when they camped in retreat.  It was fun to think about, keeping the bits in packs and not getting set up quick enough, so that their backpacks kept catching fire.”  Snapping the small closures that held the blade to her palm, she looked up at him, and the bewilderment plain on her face sent an ache like one of her daggers through his chest.  “I don’t understand.”

“Understand what, then?”   He needed to hear her out and, too, needed the physical space between them to maintain enough distance to listen instead of comfort.

“Why I’m never allowed to keep anyone safe?  I don’t understand why it’s such a sodding crime for me to want to do that.” Aeryn trailed off, suddenly uncertain.    

Sebastian started twice to answer the question, fighting between the urge to allow her anything and wanting to reassure her.  Finally settling on, “And now you know how we feel.”

“What?  Sebastian, she’s the only family I have left...why?”

“And who do we have, but you?  And what will happen to you, keeping her...us, safe?”

“Nothing ever happens to me! It’s not…”

Sebastian was on his feet as Aeryn glared at him, all the calm the prayers had laid over the morning’s stress dissipated like holy smoke.  “It is exactly the same.  Do not lessen our fear.  Whatever you think of yourself, you are worth no less to us.” Pacing, he whirled on her.  “Here’s a thing I do not understand.  After all we’ve learned of your father, why is it you still believe that you are not just as precious…”

Aeryn snarled, “Don’t bring him into this.”

He clenched his fists.  “He’s always in this.  He is always there, whispering in your ear telling you you are only fit to stand between someone else and death.  So let me tell you a thing, Aeryn Hawke.” Sebastian spat her family name as he stalked towards Aeryn and her eyes narrowed dangerously, her stance shifting wider.  Fine.  Let it be.  He had to say it.   

“I have been a believer in Andraste my whole life.  Even before I was a follower, I believed in her and the authority of her holy Chant.  I gave ten years of my life to that devotion, believing that the Divine and her Mothers and Seekers and Templars were working the will of the Maker.” He flexed his fingers slowly out to touch a strand of dark hair, where it caught the light and turned to flame.  Aeryn didn’t flinch, her eyes fixed on his face as he ground out, “And if one of the Divine’s Hands so much as snipped this hair on your dragonthick skull, Maker help me, I would rain down such fury upon their heads that they would die before they could blink.  Without one thought to the consequence.  You mean that much.  And don’t you dare, ever again, tell me otherwise.”

“Sebastian…”  she whispered.

Softer, he pleaded, “You are all we have.  All I have.  You say you don’t understand why you’re not allowed to protect her?   Your sister at least has the sense to tell us when we’re expecting too much.  All you do is take more on, and expect us to stand aside and watch you break under the strain.  She loves you.  Her whole life, except for the years in the Gallows, she watched you sacrifice and bury your pain to keep her safe.  Why would you think she’d consent to it now, that she’s finally seen the cost of it?”

“I didn’t mind.”  She said it simply, gently.  Her hand sketched the air next to his cheekbone as if it was too fragile to touch.  “I don’t.”

“We mind.”

He did.  It was written in the ferocity with which he spoke and the barely restrained violence in his touch.  He’d laid it out for her as plainly as if he’d painted it.  All he had?  It wasn’t true, not entirely.  Fenris and Bethany would take good care of him if anything ever happened to her.  

Aeryn let her fingers brush his cheekbone and Sebastian turned into the faint contact as if he was starving.   

They wouldn’t be enough, would they?  Would it be enough for you?

Aeryn turned the idea of Bethany’s guilt over in her head.  It felt odd.  But...that was the whole reason so much of her training had been secret, wasn’t it?  Not just to keep Mother happy, but to keep it from Bethany.  Father had never explained why, exactly.

Guilt, then.  Guilt enough to send her soft-hearted sister running to the Templars.  And hadn’t that been just what had happened?  But not only guilt.  Bethany was as much Hawke as anyone, certainly enough of her own woman to rebel against the...cage she’d been in.  She’d wanted it to be her choice.  One cage to another...did choice make that much difference?

“I am trying to get it.  I’m just...tired of being the last one standing.” Aeryn looked down and then back up at him.  “Afraid of it.”

The last of his anger receding left Sebastian drained and he sighed, “I know.”  He kissed her palm, murmuring, “I’ve half a mind to turn around and take us all back to Ferelden, tomorrow.”

Her brows lifted, “But, you can’t.”  

“Oh, I could.”

“It’s your home, Sebastian.  You need to see this through.  Even if we don’t stay.  Even if we get there and decide it’s not possible. You need to see.”  She gripped his arm, reminding him of the soldier she’d been.  “I had Lothering hanging in the back of my head for so long.  Seeing Ferelden, Denerim at least, rebuilding made leaving again...easier.”

“We will give Cleve to the end of the week, then we’re going.  I do not want to be living in this city with a threat over you like that.”

Sebastian had that stubborn set to his chin, but he was looking up at her through his long reddish brown lashes and Aeryn inwardly sighed at the unfair combination hit.  “Alright. If you’re ready to go, we’ll go.  It’s your campaign.  I’ll need to tell Varric to cancel his cook.  No sense in keeping one for a week or less. We should keep the house, though.  It’s...a locus.  They’ll expect us to come back and it might distract them from traipsing after.”

“Fine.”   He dropped his hand and stepped back from her to turn back to the window.  “Thank you.”

Aeryn took a deep breath, appreciating the space.  Her head was spinning a little from Sebastian’s sudden anger.  It settled so far under his usual gentle calm that when it sprang up, it was disconcerting.  The way it sent chimes ringing down her spine.   Disorienting.  To say the least.  Bloody Void.  

But he’d had a sodding stressful morning, hadn’t he?  Death at his throat while she mused over his pretty blue eyes.  Even Sebastian’s posture, normally so beautifully upright when he stood, had taken a beating.  Poor darling.

Crossing the room, Aeryn reached out to spread her hands over the breadth of his shoulders; he slouched under her fingers as she kneaded, tension rippling under the wool shirt.  

“Long enough to restock, long enough for you to feel we’re rested and in trim.”  He pressed back into her hands as she hugged him.  

Leaning her forehead against his back, she breathed in.  “A week is enough.  If Cleve’s not back, we’ll go.  I should tell Varric to cancel the cook.  And arrange severance for Bindy and Kayla.”   

“Ah... Varric’s gone out again.”  

“You didn’t make him?  He’s been running all over town since we got here.”

“He offered?”  And he had no interest in seeing Aeryn scrub her fingers to the bone working to keep them all fed while they waited for Cleve.

Aeryn groaned, “I owe him a good night in.  Possibly a bar full of fawning admirers.  Possibly a bar.” She wanted to ask if she was forgiven, but she didn’t think she was.  She wasn’t sure he could forgive her for something that was just...part of her. Swallowing, she added, “When you go to the Chantry, take Fenris or Varric.”

Sebastian turned around in her arms, frowning at the blunt order and her hollow tone but before he could say anything there was a knock at the door.

“Just a moment.”  Aeryn was tugging her jerkin back on as Sebastian opened the door to reveal Lidia.  

“Excuse me, messeres.  There’s a dwarva by the name of Hedda Bruckar waiting for you, downstairs in the dining room.  Says she had an appointment.”

“Well, that’s one thing we can take care of for Varric.  Send her up, please.”  Aeryn spoke beside him as she restrapped a belt in place, stepping into the boots placed close by.  She turned on her heel as the maid dipped a curtsey, striding to the small table that held the wash basin and an oval mirror.  Quickly, as he watched, she retouched her kohl and the lipstain, laying a dusting of powder over her pale face and rendering her mask perfect again.

“Aeryn…” But she’d shifted, again.  Drawing up elegance around her, as much a cloak as any she’d worn.  He caught a glimpse of Leandra in the queenly way she held her head.

“Let’s deal with this, hmm?”  He looked hurt but Aeryn slipped past him as the door to the shared sitting room opened to admit a stylishly dressed older dwarva with a small chapbook and a neatly slicked back bun over her high round forehead.  

“You’re Lady Hawke?”  She had a deep rich voice and Aeryn dipped her head, in acknowledgement.

“So I am.  I’m sorry to say, we’ve brought you out needlessly.  We won’t be staying long enough to need a cook.”  Aeryn tried to dismiss her briskly.

“I see.  Well.  May I ask why?”

“Circumstances have changed and we’ll be leaving town in the next few days.  There’s no longer a position.”

“Serah Tethras seemed to be under a different impression when he visited this morning with directions and to taste my piecrust.”

“It was a sudden change of plans.”  

Something to do with why there’s been Guards nosing around about you?”

“Guards?” Void.

“A City Guard followed me from my sister’s butcher shop all the way here.  Probably still out there,” she jerked her rounded chin to the window and Sebastian went to adjust the shade.

“She’s right.”  He affirmed and Aeryn turned a bland smile on the erstwhile cook.

“We’d be too much trouble for so short a period.  I am sorry to have brought you out.  May I make up for your time?”  

She’d reached for her belt purse but Hedda waved her off.  “No trouble.  I know Tulla here in the kitchen, I’ll pop in and have a chat before she starts supper.  But...you’ll be here a few days?  Who’ll do your work in that big house?  I went by, just to take a gander.”

Aeryn spread her hands.  “There are a few of us, and we’re all accustomed to doing for ourselves.”

Hedda clicked her tongue.  “Can I say something?”

“Go ahead.”  Sebastian urged her despite the cool glance Aeryn sent him.

“That’s going to make you look bad.  Serah Tethras said you had doings with the Keep, that you might be having guests from high up?”

“That’s no longer…”

“Even if you’re just here for a day...that neighborhood’s going to talk about you.  You want any sort of reputation...you need a cook and some scullery maids bopping around the markets being discreetly gossipy.  You need a doorman to take your messages.  Folks talk, Lady.  Even if you don’t want me...and I’ll tell you I’m a dandy cook and there’s not a soul who’ll tell you different.  Tulla’s been trying to get me to leave my sister’s shop and come make pies for her for the whole year since my husband died.  Even if you don’t want me...you want some one.  Or there’s going to be talk you’re not what you say.”  She gripped her chapbook in two small square hands, ending with a nod.  

Aeryn blinked.  “Is that your recipe book?”

“It is.”

“May I see it?”

Hedda handed the handmade book over.  There was a bit of floury grit on the leather cover, a few marks where a finger had left a streak of lard turned several of the pages transparent.  But the recipes were neatly recorded and lined with notes.  good for finicky stomachs, fine on cool mornings, best crust for hot weather.

Sebastian looked over Aeryn’s shoulder.  “Is that a recipe for fish pie?”

“It is.  It’s a favorite.  I use rock shrimp and steamed scallops this time of year though.”

And potatoes?

She wrinkled her nose.  “Oh, no.  That’s a stretcher and with the crust, its too heavy.  Onions and mushrooms and diced sweet peppers.”  

“Ah.”  Sebastian smiled and Aeryn glanced at him questioningly.  “That’s the way our cook used to make them,” he explained.  

“Someone I might know, serah?  That’s a local dish.”  

“No, Mistress Hedda.  Long ago, I’m afraid and she’s gone to the Maker’s side since.”  He gave her a small bow that sent a fresh blast of warmth across her coppery skin.  

He liked her.  Blast. “Well and good, but we’d generally want plain cooking; porridge in the mornings, roast meats and simple soups at dinner and supper.  There’ll need to be a cold tray available at night and anytime fish is served, you’ll have to provide another meat.  One of our company is averse.”

“Easily done enough.”

“I expect a quiet, discreet household.  There will be no gossip allowed about us.”

That clearly took her aback.  She frowned as Aeryn handed her back her recipes.  “Now, messere.  That’s somewhat hard.”

“No gossip about who comes and goes or household habits.  Anyone who does is out the door, no reprieves and no pay past that day.”  Aeryn tipped her head.  “You want to trade recipes or what we wear, talk about the hired boy next door’s arse, that’s fine.  Anything beyond that is off limits unless we tell you differently.  Do you know the scullery maid Serah Tethras has hired?”

“My cousin’s neighbor’s daughter.  She’s a quiet little spark.  Good hand with hair, too.” She leaned in, with a small smile. She’d noticed Sebastian’s uneven cut and Aeryn’s closely cropped cap.

“Not necessary.”  Aeryn flicked her hand.  “Varric arranged the salary?  I’ll pay by the day, since it’s so short a time.”

Hedda nodded, “Very generous...even for a week.  I’m saving up to move to Wildervale.  I’d like to start an inn.  Or Hercinia.  Always liked the seaside,” she mused.

“We’ll have a couple of message runners. Not living in, but you’ll have them at your disposal most days, so long as they can drop and run when I need it done, but no heavy lifting.  They’re just kids.”

“Are they expected not to chatter, too?”

“Yes.”  

Hmph.  Hedda seemed to think it unlikely.  

“Those are my terms.”

“Well...I suppose.  For a week, we can all keep our tongues tied.”

“I like a quiet house.”  Aeryn repeated evenly and for the first time, Hedda shifted her weight uncomfortably.  “And you may be in danger, working for us.  This is not a pleasure visit.”

“Yes, messere.  I can see that.”  She glanced curiously at Sebastian, again.  He stood behind Aeryn, trying not to interfere.  Well, not anymore than he had.  “The pay is generous and...you’ll forgive me, outside work’s not easy to come by these days.  I can handle a butcher knife and a rolling pin pretty handy, if need be.”  

“Fine.  We’ll be shifting camp tomorrow, first thing.  Feel free to come poke in the kitchens, make a list of what you’ll need though I think all the gear is in place for basics.  Deliveries from the market can start at 10 bells so long as you’re there to organize it.”

“I’ll be there, bright and early.”  Aeryn shook her hand and Sebastian bowed again.  As soon as Hedda closed the door behind her, Aeryn strode to the window to eye the Guard over.  There were two, now, he realized as he joined her by the sill.

“I’m going to catch up with Varric.  See if one of them follows me.  The other might be waiting for Hedda to leave.”

“I’ll come with you.  We can have Fenris watch…”

“No, stay here.  I don’t want to have to split my attention.”  Aeryn snapped the last as she snagged her daggers up and fixed the strap.  “We still don’t know if that assassin had a partner and you’re still recovering from the trek, too.”

“And if they’re out for you, too?”

Aeryn sheathed the slender black dagger away.  “Then we’ll have more information than we had earlier.  Stay here.”  She took a deep breath and placed her hand on his chest, willing herself to ask, “Please, love?  Varric will be back, he needs to know that we’ve changed our minds about staying, if I miss him.”

Sebastian felt the indignation drain out of him, leaving him nearly limp.  Aeryn had bitten her lip and cocked her head up at him, beseeching.   And he had a small victory, getting her to keep the household help. “If it’s necessary.  Be careful.”

“As I can be.”  She tiptoed up to kiss his cheek, quirking a smile at his sigh.  He’d manipulated her fair enough into keeping the cook.  Couldn’t let him win every time, though.

Ten minutes later, Aeryn was strolling in the marketplace, feeling the guardsman’s eyes on the back of her neck.  He was scout-trained, reasonably light on his feet and quick to note how she had occasionally changed directions without having to obviously change his.  Good man.  Gellas should commend him.

She dropped by the dressmaker’s and checked on the progress of the last of her order, a smart black dress made to recent style that could handle being stuffed in a pack for easy travel.  Madame was out, but her daughter assured Aeryn that the last of the embroidery should be finished by morning and was kind enough to give her directions to the next couple of places on Aeryn’s errand list.  

She’d intended to bring Sebastian to the tailor again, but that wasn’t particularly necessary now.  She picked up three more pairs of wool socks for Fenris’ narrow feet, tucking them away.  Boots.  Had to get him out for boots.  The weather was warming, but that new skin on his feet would be too tender for any sort of trekking, yet.

As she crossed the street to the jeweler’s she noticed a second guard had joined the first.  A tall, rangy, woman, a wicked looking crossbow slung across her broad shoulders.  Aeryn scanned the rest of the area.  They looked to just be sharing a few moments of downtime while their patrol routes crossed.  And out of the corner of her eye, she spied…

“Bindy, you ought to be in school.”

“Out for the month, messere.”

“That so?”

“Teacher’s gone to visit her sick mum so we’ve got a break.”  He munched a dried plum from the small sack she offered.  “You in trouble, Messere?”

“Just Hawke, pup.”

“Hawke,” he tried it out and shrugged, but his curious round eyes never left her.  

“No, not really.  Have you seen Varric about?”

“He left the inn about two marks ago, Kayla caught up to him ‘case he needed a message sent.”

Well, I don’t need a message sent.  I’m just out shopping, alright?”

“Sure. I’m just waiting for something for mum.  Be another ten minutes or so, if you wanted a bit of company.”

Aeryn chuckled.  “You stay out of trouble.  If trouble finds me, you hightail it.  Got me?”

“Yes, messere.”

“This a good shop, you think?”  She pointed out the jeweler.

He squinted.  “Eh, I guess.  Rich folks mostly.  I never been in.”

“Well, that’s about to change I guess.  Pretend to be a pageboy, hmm?”

He tucked his snack away and smoothed down his thick bangs, trying to stand taller.  “It’d be easier with some fancy clothes.”  

“You’re right, but if you can’t fool folks in your own gear, you won’t fool them too long in an embroidered hassock.” She handed him the small leather basket she used for shopping and told him,”Hold this and come along.”

Swinging the door open chimed a series of bells, a string attached to the door led to the back room.  Mostly just a loud notice of customers, but Aeryn noted smaller bells fixed to the high narrow windows and painted to match the brown trimwork.  Not a bad security measure.  She lifted her fingers and the boy stood neatly in the middle of the shop, easily seen.  Good lad.  He knew how to make himself conspicuous and unthreatening.

“May I help you, serah?”

The merchant was a stockily built woman about Aeryn’s own age with delicate gold bracelets winding up her solid forearms and spiraling black curls caught in matching gold combs.   “Are you the jeweler?”

“I am, indeed!  Thalia de Pesset, at your service”

Aeryn nodded towards the small case in the display.  I’m looking for rings.  I saw a piece of yours at my dressmakers and thought to see if you’d anything I’d be interested in.

Ah, you attend Madame’s!  I make her a piece now and again to match some confection she’s designed!  Was it the feathered choker?  I was quite pleased with how that turned out!”

Aeryn smiled at the bubbly woman. “It was.”

“I doubt I’d have many that might fit you...hmm. She’d crossed the floor and started to reach out to take up Aeryn’s hands, muttering to herself, “Small hands but tsk, you’ve been popping your knuckles!  Didn’t your mother ever warn you off such?”  She broke off as she took in the small scars, the repeated injury and proof of Aeryn’s trade.  “Ah.  Perhaps your mother wasn’t such a fine influence, then?” She paused with her hands out and glanced down into Aeryn’s face.

“She did her best.  But the ring is for someone else.”

“Feathers, still though? You aren’t the feathery sort, I’d think.”  The jeweler backed away, chattering, and started to flip through a small sketch book.  “Ah!” She held it out.

Aeryn looked at the charcoal drawing.  “Something like that would do nicely.”  She flicked open a small pocket and laid a simple silver ring on the table in front of them, pale maple polished until it shone like stone.  “That’s the size I’d need.”

“Surely.  Big fellow? Long fingers or stubby?  I’d make a narrower ring for a short-fingered man, you see.”

“Long.  Elegant. Usually well-kept.”

“Lucky you.”  Thalia pursed her mouth.  “I’ve rose and yellow gold and silver in stock.  Platinum will take a day or two to cadge. And it will take a bit to carve the mold...all told.  A week.”

Aeryn set a small linen purse next to the ring, tugging open the drawstring.  Three perfect stones; a ruby, a small square emerald, and a carved yellow diamond slid out.  She palmed the stones and raised an eyebrow at the intake of breath.

“In a hurry, are we? Maybe six days?” Aeryn laid the ruby out.  “Five?”

The diamond followed.  “Four days and I’ll have to bump clientele.”  

Instead of the emerald, Aeryn laid out a rendered bar of silverite.

“Make it out of this.  You can keep the scrap and I’ll add in the emerald upon completion.”

Shrewdly, Thalia narrowed her eyes.  “I usually work for coin.  Stones like that, I’ll have to…”

Aeryn shrugged and swept up the jewels.  “Bindy, you said you knew another jeweler?”

“Oh, yes ma’am!”  The lad perked right up and headed for the door, as if eager to lead her off.

“No!  No, now.  Wait.  I thought since you were in a hurry you might bargain a little.”

“I’m in a hurry enough to not want to waste time with negotiations.”

“My work is the highest quality.”  Her hands twisted, allowing the warm light from several sconces to catch on the subtle cutwork and curve of her own bracelets.  “There’s no waste in taking time for a piece of art.”  
  


“Oh, I don’t doubt.  But I’m only in town for a few days and this was something of a whim.”

“A whim you’re willing to pay dearly for.”  She leaned over the counter, conspiratorily, now that she had the solid wood between them.  It was too low for any real protection, but perhaps she felt herself heavy enough to keep someone like Aeryn from yanking her about.  There were two small cases that would be easily cracked, displaying enamelled combs and a spray of pearl and pink gold earrings in a small variety of spiralling shapes.

Redirecting the path her thoughts had taken and tightening her hands on the bag, Aeryn shrugged, “I don’t have them often.”

“Everything you’re wearing is rune-marked and charmed.  I know someone who could…”

“No.”  Aeryn growled the word out and Thalia’s dark eyes widened.

“I...see.”

“Simple metalwork, and metalwork alone is all I’m looking for. And I assure you, I will know if it’s been tampered with.”  

The jeweler looked at Aeryn down her nose, the tiny glint of a jewel on the left side cool and distracting.  “My metalwork is never simple.  But I understand.  I was just trying to cadge some work for a friend.”  

Aeryn took a mental breath and lashed down her temper.  There was no way for this woman to know what had gone on today.  She wasn’t likely another assassin, cursing rings for profit.  Then again, the quick work of the fake barber, to place herself just so with less than a quarter of an hour between when Sebastian had spied the sign and when they’d wandered over?  No.  Stop.  “Of course.  Not today.”

As if she were similarly redirecting herself, Thalia re-fixed her business-like bustle.  “Come by in a couple of days.  I’ll pour one of base metal and we’ll see if you like the design?”

“That sounds fine. Thank you.”  Aeryn handed over the linen pouch, watching the jeweler’s skilled fingers, marked by tiny burn scars, feel out the shapes inside, gauge the weight.  

Bindy followed her out and waited until they’d crossed the square before he nudged her elbow. “You okay, mes..Hawke?”

Aeryn gave him a tight smile as her eyes scanned over his head for...  Yeah, there they were.  Rangy crossbow and...ah, the one who’d escorted them to see the Captain.  “I’m fine.  You did excellent work, by the way.  Perfect attitude to lend me an air of upright citizen.”  

“Well, so you are.  At least, so’s I’ve told my mum.”  He grinned, showing off crooked front teeth like small river pearls.  “I might have said you’d come by, meet her?”

“I will, tomorrow if that’s fine with her.  After we finish our move over to the house.  I’m going back to the inn, like as not, Varric’s back by now.  Didn’t you have an errand to run?”  

“Nah.  Just seeing what you were up to.”  He caught the silver she flipped him and tucked it away as he dashed off.  “Thanks for the plums, Hawke!  See you tomorrow”

She decided she’d had enough of being observed.  Let them wonder a bit.  An older elf, with a handcart full of winter squash and a sack of apples; all looking a bit wrinkled and tired after long cold months in storage, crossed her path and cast her into shadow.  

Three heartbeats later, she glanced over her shoulder at the two bewildered guards.  Grinning to see the scout; clearly put out with them as he raised his hands and pointed, sending them scurrying to find her.

She’d let them catch up at the inn.  No sense in making things hard on people just trying to get a day in, especially since they’d stayed out of her hair.  Such as it was.  Still.  All the trouble Gellas said he was having and enough free time to set his troops out on her?  

Not a good sign.  But there were measures she could take.  Aeryn let the shadows tug at her heels as she turned down an alley.

The small stolid brick house, tucked down a scenic tree lined street not too far from their own, was simple enough to find.  The rowhouse beside it had a beautiful wrought iron grate running up the farside and a flat portico that provided a decent look out.  Aeryn perched on a brick protuberance in the shade cast by an ancient pine and waited, braiding small wreaths out of the long, fragrant, dry needles that had fallen on the roof around her.  

A halfmark and eight wreaths passed silently, providing her all the information she needed.  Sebastian would be wondering where she was.

Sebastian had done his best.  Worked his bowstring, checked over his quiver, examined the straps of his harness and belt for worn leather or cracked stitching.  All fine.  His armor was polished and ready for...whatever.  He’d even sat down and written out the first paragraph of one of Elthina’s sermons on Transfigurations, echoing in his head.  Gain and loss.  Fire and light.  Uncertainty.  

An hour later, he was struggling with uncertainties of a baser sort.  

Go down to dinner?  That Starkish couple might be there again.  Aeryn had been quite interested in them, in their hinted troubles.  He wasn’t quite as skilled as she in eavesdropping, but he might be able to divine a detail or two that she and Varric wouldn’t catch.  Accents varied between noble and upper-class rankings, rather a lot.  Place names and such might tell him where they were from.

Or would she be annoyed with him, for leaving the room?  So be it.  He wasn’t going to stay locked up.  Surely she didn’t expect it.  

He paused.  There were clouds gathering and a deeper chill seeping through the windows.  Perhaps he could go down to the stables and set up a small practice court, before the weather changed?  

His stomach growled and decided him.  He tugged his boots back on and started to open the door.

Only to reveal Bethany, her hand raised to knock and warm eyes wide at his sudden appearance.  “Gracious, Sebastian!”

“Forgive me, I didn’t realized you were there. Did you need something?”

“Just to ask if you’d finished your pacing and knocking about?  I thought I could finish your haircut.”  She held up a small pair of steel scissors.  “Fenris fell asleep, finally.  His lungs have cleared, thank the Maker for simple gifts.”

“I am glad to hear it.  Was I disturbing you?”

She shook her head.  “Not at all.”  A glance around the room showed him alone and clicking her tongue in disapproval, Bethany asked him,  “Did Aeryn abandon you?”

“She went to look for Varric.  I imagine they’ve found each other, by now.”  Priden wasn’t that big.  Or perhaps he should be worried. No, the guard was still outside.  Surely if Aeryn had run foul of Gellas’ suspicion, he’d have moved on.  Acted.

“She left you here?  Well, good to know it isn’t just me she wants locked in a velvet showcase.”

Startled by their similar trail of thoughts, Sebastian demured, “That’s not it.  Well, not entirely.  She is having to look in so many directions just now.  I think she needed a bit of space to think and too, we have some company.”  He drew her into the room and pointed out the guard that had stayed behind.  “There were two.  She wanted to see if she was followed.”

“And was she?”  The guard looked restless, shifting his feet and rearranging himself against the low stable wall.

“Right after her, yes.  Captain Gellas isn’t as trusting as he claims to be.”

“Well, who can blame him, really, if Varric’s tales have travelled beyond Kirkwall.  The Champion has quite a reputation for mayhem.  I wouldn’t want her in ten miles of any city I was fond of.”  Bethany saw Sebastian gather himself for an argument and waved him off.  “Oh stop. The Champion, not my sister.  I know well enough they aren’t one in the same?”

He had been about to vault into Aeryn’s defense.  “Ah.”  Rubbing a hand over his face, Sebastian stopped himself from scuffing a toe sheepishly.  

She poked him towards the small leather chair with a laugh.  “Sit down, you lovesick fool.  Your beloved is safe from me and my tongue.”

He went with good grace and let Bethany tuck a linen towel around his shoulders before she dipped his comb, lying comfortably besides Aeryn’s brush, in the basin and proceeded to dampen his hair before she started her trimming.

They were quiet for a few moments, the snip of the scissors even and quick.  Bethany tipped his head forward and felt him tense, suddenly.  She quickly lifted her hands away and stood back, speaking quietly. “It’s just me, Sebastian.  It’s all right.”

“Yes, of course.  Excuse me.”

Bethany glanced at the scissors she held.  They were Aeryn’s, from her portable workbasket and lent to Bethany for bandaging.  The black iron blades, despite their common usage, were very sharp.  “It must have been frightening.”

His shrug was more elegant than Aeryn’s.  “I barely had time to consider it.  One moment I was getting a trim and the next she was…”

“Doing what she does?”  

Sebastian raised his shoulders and let them drop again, trying to relax.  “Exactly.”

“Shall I stop?”

“No, finish please.”  He leaned forward and allowed her to make a clean line across the back of his neck.  “It was sudden.  And, not frightening but..I had not thought myself any sort of target.  Now, I must consider that my cousin is adamant about keeping Starkhaven for his own and willing to kill me to ensure it.”

“Does that surprise you?”  

“I had not thought about Goran, beyond the fact that he was never a bad fellow.  Slow and bumbling, I’d thought.  But...power can change a person.  Almost always, it changes them.  And the things we have heard of could be simple neglect.  Or not.”

Bethany flicked one ruddy brown curl off his shoulder before she asked, “And are you willing to kill him, if he has changed?”

“I do not want it to come to that.  I hope it will not.  But if he is responsible for the elves leaving the city, if he has driven the merchants so that not even travelling caravans can do business there...if the city is in dire straits?  I will not steal from him but I will...do what is necessary.”

“You’ll do it?”  Her emphasis was stinging, but he didn’t flinch as the scissors closed with a hiss behind the point of his jawbone.  

“Are you asking me if I’ll have Aeryn do my dirty work?” She set her hand on his shoulder asking for stillness and snipped around his ear.  When she’d finished, he answered, “There are no traditions in Starkhaven for trial by combat between candidates for the throne, no precedents for what’s to come.  I can hope that I will be allowed to make my case before the nobles in civilized manner.  I can hope that no one else will have to suffer to bring about a change but...if it comes to it, I will kill him.”

His declaration hung in the air as she brushed away the gleaming flecks of cut hair that were clinging to his neck.

“You’re all done, Sebastian.  Your fake actually did you a fair job, before hand.” She picked up Aeryn’s hand mirror from the wash stand and handed to him.  It was shorter than he’d worn it in years.  More like it had been when he’d just left the Chantry.  He touched the close cropped hair above his ears.  In the reflection, there was a strand of silver glinting and he had to resist the throb of vanity urging him to pluck it out.  He’d earned that silver.  Mayhaps it even brought a bit of wisdom along with it.

Bethany met his eyes in the mirror.  “It was uneven, I had to trim a bit close.”

“It’s fine, you’ve done it well.  You Hawkes, always full of surprising talents.”  Sebastian threw off the moment, and he smiled up at her.

Bethany shook her head and folded the towel up to catch the hair that had dropped, “You’re very sweet.”  If he’d been Carver, she’d have patted his head.   If he’d been Carver, she’d never have called him sweet, though.  

Pushing himself up out of his chair, his stomach protested the delay to his mealtime again and he excused himself as her lips twitched, clearly trying to hold back a wry comment.  “Come and have lunch with me?”

“Aeryn said she’d planned for you to eat while you were out.”  She’d had a bowl of soup with Fenris. but another bite wouldn’t go amiss.  

“It got cut short and now I smell rabbit pie.  And I am a bit fond of it.”  His sweet smile went a bit mischievous around the edges, like a glimpse of the boy he must have been once.  Was it that hint of wildness, that had drawn Aeryn to the solemn brother Bethany remembered?  She had liked the solemnity, that sense of gravity that surrounded him.  And the eyes, why lie to herself, though they had always been fixed elsewhere; on Andraste, on the Maker, on Elthina.  Until the day they had fixed on Aeryn.  And not wavered again.  

She pushed him towards the door, laughing. “Well, then, by all means let’s go get some before you perish.”

**Author's Note:**

>  _Author's Notes:  
>  With any luck at all, chapters will go up every Monday. Hope you enjoy!  
> In my headcanon, Sebastian grew up speaking Starkish, the DA equivalent of Scottish Gaelic, so translations follow. All such are taken from the internet, so any errors are due to poor translation, aye?  
> _fuathaich _: abomination  
> _ mo chridhe _: my heart  
> _ a ruin _: my love  
> _ leannan _: beloved, sweetheart_  
> 


End file.
